amctfcan 


EDITED  BY 


JOHN  T.  MORSE,  JR. 


WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD 


THORNTON  KIRKLAND  LOTHROP. 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY 


1899 


1896, 
KIRKLAND  LOTHROP. 

rights  reserved. 


The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridge,  Mass.,  U.  S.  A. 
Electrotyped  and  Printed  by  H.  O.  Houghton  &  Company. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

YOUTH.  —  ADMISSION  TO  THE  BAK.  —  FIRST  STEPS  IN 
POLITICS 1 

CHAPTER  II. 
GOVERNOR  OF  NEW  YORK 23 

CHAPTER  III. 

PROFESSIONAL  LIFE.  —  Six  YEARS  A  PRIVATE  CITIZEN  .      43 

CHAPTER  IV. 
THE  COMPROMISE  RESOLUTIONS 62- 

CHAPTER  V. 
CALIFORNIA  AND  THE  COMPROMISES  :  SEWARD'S  SPEECH     86 

CHAPTER  VI. 
FILLMORE'S  ADMINISTRATION 106 

CHAPTER  VII. 
THE  REPEAL  OF  THE  MISSOURI  COMPROMISE        .        .    122 

CHAPTER  VIII. 
THE  FORMATION  OF  THE  REPUBLICAN  PARTY   .       .       142 

CHAPTER  IX. 
THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS 162 

CHAPTER  X. 

THE  DRED  SCOTT  CASE.  — THE  FINAL  STRUGGLE  FOR 
KANSAS  181 


82877 


vi  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER   XI. 
THE  REPUBLICAN  CONVENTION  OF  1860   .       .       .       .209 

CHAPTER  XII. 
THE  WINTER  OF  1860-61 220 

CHAPTER  XIII. 
THE  CABINET.  —  FOKT  SUMTEK 246 

CHAPTER  XIV. 
JUSTICE  CAMPBELL  AND  THE  REBEL  COMMISSIONERS  .       258 

CHAPTER  XV. 
LETTER   OF   APRIL    IST    TO   THE   PRESIDENT.  —  THE 

BLOCKADE 276 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

ENGLAND'S   RECOGNITION  OF  THE   CONFEDERATES  AS 

BELLIGERENTS 292 

CHAPTER  XVII. 

NEGOTIATIONS  AS  TO  THE  TREATY  OF  PARIS.  —  SUSPEN 
SION  OF  THE  HABEAS  CORPUS 311 

CHAPTER  XVIH. 
THE  TRENT 320 

CHAPTER  XIX. 

INTERVENTION.  —  CABINET   DIFFICULTIES.  —  EMANCI 
PATION    348 

CHAPTER  XX. 
DIPLOMATIC  QUESTIONS  OF  THE  WAR  ....       368 

CHAPTER  XXI. 

SECRETARY  OF  STATE  UNDER  JOHNSON.  —  RETIREMENT 
FROM  PUBLIC  LIFE  .    396 


WILLIAM  HENRY 


CHAPTER  I. 

YOUTH.  —  ADMISSION    TO    THE    BAB.  —   FIRST 
STEPS   IN   POLITICS. 

WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD  was  born  on  the 
16th  of  May,  1801,  in  Florida,  a  village  in  the 
town  of  Warwick,  in  the  county  of  Orange,  and 
state  of  New  York.  His  father,  Dr.  Samuel  S. 
Seward,  was  a  physician  of  good  standing,  and 
the  first  vice-president  of  the  county  medical 
society.  Dr.  Seward  was  a  farmer  as  well  as 
physician,  and  also  the  magistrate,  storekeeper, 
banker,  and  money-lender  of  the  little  place. 
He  lived  to  a  good  old  age,  dying  after  his  son's 
election  to  the  senate  of  the  United  States,  in 
1849. 

The  family  was  of  New  Jersey  origin.  John 
Seward,  the  grandfather  of  William  Henry, 
served  in  the  Revolution,  beginning  as  captain, 
and  ending  his  campaigns  as  colonel  of  the  First 
Sussex  Regiment.  Sussex  is  the  northernmost 


2  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

county  of  New  Jersey,  and  Orange  county  lies 
on  the  southern  border  of  New  York,  so  that  the 
•  .migration  :oJ;  •Dr.  Seward  did  not  carry  him  far 
•irom  *"his  'orighiaj%  home.     He  married  a  Miss 
:  J&qriiagsJ  f  r  Jm/ilje/neighborhood  of  Florida,  and 
"  Se'ward  *  speaks  of  his  mother  as  a  "person  of 
excellent  sense,  gentleness,  truthfulness  and  can 
dor."     William  Henry  was   the   fourth  of  six 
children,  and,  after  the  fashion  of  those  days, 
was  selected,  as  the  least  physically  robust,  to 
receive  a  college  education.     The  village  school, 
the  academy  at  Goshen,  and  a  term  or  two  in 
a  short-lived  academy  in  Florida,  gave  him  his 
preparatory  training,  and  at  the  age  of  fifteen 
he  passed  the  examination  for  the  junior  class 
at  Union  College,  Schenectady ;  though  the  rules 
as  to  age  at  that  institution  compelled  him  to 
enter  as  sophomore. 

Before  going  to  college,  Seward  at  home  had 
taken  his  share  of  the  household  duties  and 
labors.  His  father  had  three  domestic  servants 
(slaves,  some  of  whom  lived  to  a  good  old  age 
and  were  Seward's  pensioners  to  the  end  of  their 
days)  ;  but  William  Henry  drove  the  cows  to 
pasture  in  the  early  morning  and  back  again  at 
night ;  he  had  the  wood  to  chop  and  bring  in, 
and  other  daily  chores  to  do.  He  began  his 
labors  at  dawn,  and  finished  them  at  bed-time, 
about  nine  o'clock.  At  school  he  was  a  bright 


YOUTH.  6 

and  studious  boy,  perhaps  a  bit  of  a  prig.  His 
first  composition,  an  essay  on  Virtue,  began: 
"Virtue  is  the  best  of  all  the  vices."  He  re 
fused,  when  at  the  academy,  to  join  in  a  lock 
out  ;  at  college  he  sought  his  tutor's  aid  that  he 
might  really  get  hold  of  his  Latin,  and  was 
evidently  desirous  to  make  the  most  of  his  oppor 
tunities.  He  was  not  wanting,  however,  in  the 
hasty  temper  or  the  audacity  of  youth,  and  when 
an  instructor  had,  as  Seward  thought,  treated 
him  unfairly,  he  remonstrated,  refused  to  recite, 
marched  out  of  the  class-room,  left  the  college 
buildings  and  established  himself  in  a  hotel,  de 
clining  to  return  until  he  had  received  an  apol 
ogy.  The  judicious  intervention  of  Dr.  Nott, 
then  and  for  nearly  half  a  century  president  of 
Union  College,  quickly  settled  the  matter,  and 
Seward  went  back  to  his  work.  This  seems  to 
have  been  his  only  collision  with  the  authorities ; 
but  a  little  later  in  his  college  career  troubles 
of  another  sort  came  upon  him. 

On  his  arrival  in  Schenectady  he  had  been 
dissatisfied  with  the  work  of  the  traveling  tailor 
who  had  furnished  his  wardrobe ;  and,  that  he 
might  be  dressed  in  a  less  rustic  fashion,  he  had 
gone  to  the  shops  patronized  by  the  students. 
His  scanty  allowance  did  not  enable  him  to  pay 
for  this  extravagance,  his  father  would  not  help 
him,  and  his  creditors  became  clamorous ;  so  with- 


4  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

out  consulting  or  even  informing  his  family,  he 
resolved  to  abandon  his  college  career,  and  begin 
at  once  to  make  his  own  way  in  the  world.  He 
quietly  left  Schenectady,  joined  a  friend  who 
was  engaged  to  teach  at  the  South,  and  sailed 
with  him  for  Savannah.  His  father,  learning 
of  his  departure,  started  in  pursuit,  and  endeav 
ored  unsuccessfully  to  intercept  him  in  New 
York.  Seward  arrived  safely  in  Georgia,  and 
obtained  a  position  there  as  the  teacher  of  a 
newly  established  academy.  His  father  learned 
his  whereabouts  and  wrote  in  a  rage  to  the 
trustees,  threatening  them  with  all  the  terrors 
of  the  law  if  they  continued  to  harbor  the  delin 
quent,  whom  he  described  as  "  a  much-indulged 
son,  who,  without  any  just  provocation,  had  ab 
sconded  from  Union  College,  thereby  disgracing 
a  well  -  acquired  position,  and  plunging  his  pa 
rents  into  profound  shame  and  grief."  Seward, 
however,  remained  at  his  post  as  teacher  until 
the  appointment  and  arrival  of  his  successor, 
and  then  returned  home  to  pass  six  months 
studying  law  in  an  attorney's  office  at  Goshen. 
At  the  end  of  this  time  he  rejoined  the  senior 
class  at  Union  College,  graduating  with  honor 
in  1820.  His  father  upon  his  return  was  far 
from  killing  the  fatted  calf  for  this  wandering 
son ;  he  still  declined  to  assist  him  in  paying  the 
tailor's  bills,  and  they  were  finally  discharged 


ADMISSION   TO    THE   BAR.  5 

by  installments  from  Seward's  own  hard  earn 
ings.  Writing  of  this  after  the  lapse  of  half  a 
century,  Seward  says :  "  I  would  by  no  means 
imply  a  present  conviction  that  the  fault  was  al 
together  with  my  father.  On  the  other  hand,  I 
think  now  the  fault  was  not  altogether  mine." 
As,  before  his  own  exodus,  two  of  his  brothers 
had  already  left  home  on  account  of  money  dif 
ficulties  with  their  father,  there  was  probably 
some  justification  for  these  conclusions. 

On  leaving  college,  Seward  resumed  the  study 
of  the  law,  and  occupied  himself  also  with  office 
work  and  such  other  professional  employment  as 
he  could  obtain  in  the  inferior  courts.  He  was 
admitted  to  the  bar  at  Utica  in  October,  1822. 
His  earnings  while  a  student  had  not  only  ena 
bled  him  to  cancel  his  college  debts  and  to  pay 
his  way,  but  left  him  sixty  dollars  with  which  to 
begin  life.  He  started  at  once  for  western  New 
York,  and  at  Auburn  accepted  an  offer  of  a 
partnership  with  Elijah  Miller,  a  leading  lawyer 
of  that  town.  How  far  Mr.  Miller  was  induced 
to  make  this  proposal  by  his  good  opinion  of 
Seward's  abilities,  and  how  much  he  was  influ 
enced  by  his  knowledge  of  the  mutual  interest 
in  each  other  of  his  daughter  Frances  and  the 
young  lawyer,  one  cannot  tell,  but  the  legal  part 
nership  was  speedily  followed  by  a  closer  rela 
tion  between  them,  Seward  marrying  Frances 


6  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

MiUer  on  the  20th  of  October,  1824.  His 
marriage  was  a  satisfaction,  and  his  professional 
success  was  an  agreeable  disappointment  to  his 
father,  who  had  dismissed  him,  when  he  left 
home  to  begin  his  practice,  with  a  present  of  fifty 
dollars,  and  "the  assurance  of  his  constant  ex 
pectation  that  he  would  come  back  too  soon." 

Seward's  first  appearance  in  court,  after  his 
admission  to  the  bar,  was  in  defense  of  a  con 
vict  just  discharged  from  the  State  prison  at 
Auburn,  who  had  been  warned  to  leave  town  at 
once.  The  temptation  of  an  open  house-door 
was  too  much  for  him.  He  went  in  and  began 
to  steal,  but  was  disturbed  in  his  operations  and 
got  only  a  few  trifles.  He  was  indicted  for 
the  larceny  of  a  quilted  holder  and  a  piece  of 
calico.  Seward  proved  that  the  holder  was 
sewed,  not  quilted,  and  that  the  bit  of  cloth 
was  jean,  not  calico.  The  variance  caused  his 
client's  acquittal,  and  his  success  in  this  case 
was  followed  by  a  considerable  amount  of  crimi 
nal  business.  Seward  was  a  careful  draughts 
man,  taking  pains,  not  merely  with  the  sub 
stance  but  with  the  clerkly  appearance  of  every 
instrument  that  left  his  office,  so  that  he  was 
much  employed  in  this  way  also,  and  in  his  first 
year  his  professional  income  exceeded  the  five 
hundred  dollars  guaranteed  him  by  Mr.  Miller. 

In  1828,  he  was  nominated  by  Governor  Clin- 


>'  UNIVERSITY 


ADMISSION   TO   THE  BAR. 

ton  for  surrogate  of  Cayuga  county  ;  but  while 
he  was  in  Albany,  awaiting  the  confirmation  of 
his  appointment  by  the  senate,  a  meeting  in 
favor  of  the  renomination  of  President  John 
Quincy  Adams  was  held  there.  Clinton  had  just 
come  out  for  Jackson,  and  a  decided  majority 
of  the  New  York  senators  were  Jackson  men. 
Seward  was  for  Adams.  He  went  to  the  Adams 
meeting,  and  in  consequence  of  this  his  nomina 
tion  was  rejected.  His  name  was  never  again 
submitted  to  a  senate  for  its  action  until  more 
than  thirty  years  afterward,  when  Lincoln  nom 
inated  him  as  secretary  of  state. 

In  these  early  years  of  his  professional  life, 
he  took  a  lively  interest  in  the  militia  of  the 
state  of  New  York.  He  was  the  adjutant  of 
the  troop  which  met  Lafayette  on  his  arrival  at 
Auburn  in  1825,  and  accompanied  him  on  his 
night  journey  eastward  to  Syracuse.  A  few 
years  later  he  organized  a  company  of  artillery, 
contributed  largely  to  its  equipment,  and  was 
chosen  its  captain.  By  successive  promotions 
he  attained  the  rank  of  brigadier-general,  but 
declined  the  major-general's  commission  which 
was  subsequently  offered  him. 

Seward's  family  were  Jeffersonian  Kepubli- 
cans,  and  in  the  divisions  which  rent  that  party 
in  the  state  of  New  York  into  personal  factions, 
—  on  the  one  side  the  Tammany  men,  or  "  Buck- 


8  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

tails,"  as  they  were  called,  supporting  Vice-Pres- 
ident  Tompkins ;  and  on  the  other  the  followers 
of  Governor  Clinton,  "  the  Clintonians,''  —  Sew- 
ard  at  first  remained  with  his  father  on  the  side 
of  Tammany.  When  Vice-President  Tompkins 
visited  Schenectady,  Seward,  then  in  the  senior 
class,  delivered  an  address  of  welcome  on  behalf 
of  the  students  who  were  of  the  vice-president's 
party;  and  in  his  last  college  term  he  wrote  an 
essay  to  prove  that  the  Erie  canal,  then  in 
process  of  construction  under  Clinton's  auspices, 
was  an  impossibility ;  and  that,  even  if  it  could 
be  completed,  it  would  be  the  financial  ruin  of 
the  state.  But  he  was  never  quite  satisfied  with 
his  father's  explanation  of  Washington's  dissent 
from,  and  Hamilton's  opposition  to,  the  Repub 
lican  party,  which  Dr.  Seward  accounted  for 
by  Washington's  alleged  failure  in  intellectual 
power  and  independence,  and  Hamilton's  desire 
for  a  monarchy.  Moreover,  his  original  journey 
to  Auburn  had  opened  his  eyes  to  the  impor 
tance  as  well  as  to  the  practicability  of  the  Erie 
Canal ;  and  so  it  happened  by  a  gradual  process 
of  change  and  development,  that  in  1824,  he  cast 
his  vote  for  De  Witt  Clinton  as  governor,  and 
definitively  abandoned  the  party  he  had  been 
educated  to  support. 

In  the  summer  of  1824,  before  his  marriage, 
Seward,  with  his  father  and  mother  and   Mr. 


FIRST  STEPS   IN  POLITICS. 

Miller's  family,  made  a  journey  to  Niagara.  As 
they  were  driving  through  Rochester  on  their 
way  home,  a  wheel  came  off  the  coach,  and  most 
of  the  party  were  thrown  out.  Among  the  pas 
sers-by  attracted  by  the  accident  was  Thurlow 
Weed,  then  a  resident  of  Rochester,  "  the  editor 
of  a  dingy  weekly  Clintonian  newspaper,  called 
the  '  Monroe  Telegram,'  —  one  of  the  poorest 
and  worst  dressed  men  in  the  town,  living  in  a 
cheap  house  in  an  obscure  part  of  the  village  ;  " 
—  but  even  then  in  western  New  York  wielding 
in  politics  a  very  decisive  power.  "Weed  was 
helpful  to  them  in  their  misfortune  ;  and  this 
was  Seward's  first  meeting  with  the  man  whose 
friendship  and  influence  played  so  important  a 
part  in  his  whole  political  career. 

Not  long  after  his  return  from  this  journey, 
Seward  wrote  his  first  published  political  paper, 
an  Address  of  the  county  convention  at  Au 
burn,  in  October,  1824.  This  address  was  a 
bold  onslaught  on  the  "  Albany  Regency,"  a 
combination  of  a  dozen  politicians,  who,  under 
the  direction  of  Martin  Van  Buren,  dictated  for 
many  years  the  nominations  and  policy  of  the 
Democratic  party  of  the  state  of  New  York. 
On  the  fourth  of  July,  1825,  he  spoke  at  Auburn, 
and  something  of  what  he  said  is  interesting  as 
a  summary  of  his  own  convictions  at  that  time 
and  his  forecast  of  the  political  future :  — 


10  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

"  The  Missouri  question  is  settled  and  almost 
forgotten ;  the  tariff  bill  has  become  a  law ;  the 
sceptre  has  passed  from  the  Ancient  Dominion, 
and  the  union  of  these  states  is  still  unshaken. 
Believe  me,  fellow-citizens,  those  men's  wishes 
for  confusion  far  outrun  their  wisdom,  who 
believe,  or  profess  to  believe,  that  parties  upon 
cardinal  principles  will  again  arise.  The  time 
and  the  occasion  for  these  parties  have  alike 
gone  by,  and  the  attempt  to  rouse  the  vindic 
tive  feelings  which  once  existed  is  as  idle  as  the 
hope  to  call  spirits  from  the  vasty  deep.  New 
parties  are  yearly  formed  and  as  often  dis 
solved,  because  they  arise  upon  questions  of 
limited  extent,  or  out  of  regard  to  men  of  dif 
ferently  estimated  merit.  And  such  parties  will 
succeed  each  other,  as  in  rolling  seas  wave  suc 
ceeds  wave ;  but  there  will  at  times  be  a  calm, 
and  such  light  and  transitory  excitement  will 
only  serve  to  keep  the  political  waters  in  health 
ful  motion. 

"  Those,  too,  misapprehend  the  true  interests 
of  the  people  of  these  states,  or  their  intelligence, 
who  believe,  or  profess  to  believe,  that  a  sepa 
ration  will  ever  take  place  between  the  North 
and  South.  The  people  of  the  North  have  been 
seldom  suspected  of  a  want  of  attachment  to  the 
Union,  and  those  of  the  South  have  been  much 
misrepresented  by  a  few  politicians  of  a  stormy 


FIRST  STEPS   IN  POLITICS.  11 

character,  who  have  ever  been  unsupported  by 
the  people  there.  The  North  will  not  willingly 
give  up  the  power  they  now  have  in  the  national 
councils,  of  gradually  completing  a  work  in 
which,  whether  united  or  separate,  from  prox 
imity  of  territory,  we  shall  ever  be  interested  - 
the  emancipation  of  slaves.  And  the  South  will 
never,  even  in  a  moment  of  resentment,  expose 
themselves  to  a  war  with  the  North,  while  they 
have  such  a  great  domestic  population  of  slaves, 
ready  to  embrace  any  opportunity  to  assert  their 
freedom  and  inflict  their  revenge.  ...  If ,  indeed, 
these  states  were  to  be  divided  by  a  geographical 
line,  that  line  would  be  drawn  along  the  Alle- 
ghany  Mountains  or  the  Mississippi  River." 

The  sphere  of  Seward's  political  activity  for 
the  next  few  years  did  not  extend  beyond  the 
limits  of  his  town  and  county,  and  it  is  not  till 
1828  that  we  find  him  appearing  on  a  larger 
field  of  public  affairs.  In  August  of  that  year 
he  presided  over  a  convention  of  the  young  men 
of  the  state  favorable  to  the  reelection  of  John 
Quincy  Adams  to  the  presidency.  The  conven 
tion  numbered  more  than  three  hundred  and 
fifty  members,  a  body  of  earnest,  active  workers 
with  strong  political  convictions.  It  was  one  of 
the  last  of  the  state  assemblages  of  the  National 
Republican  party,  which  was  utterly  routed  and 
dispersed  by  the  Democrats  under  Jackson  in 


12  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

the  presidential  election  of  that  year.  Upon 
its  disappearance  Seward  joined,  and  soon  be 
came  active  in,  the  anti-Masonic  party  in  west 
ern  New  York,  of  which  Thuiiow  Weed  was  a 
moving  spirit.  The  rise  and  progress  of  this 
party  is  one  of  the  most  curious  episodes  in  our 
state  and  national  politics. 

In  1826  there  lived  in  Batavia  in  the  state  of 
New  York,  one  William  Morgan,  a  most  humble 
and  insignificant  person,  a  Freemason,  whose 
extreme  poverty  tempted  him  to  publish  a  book, 
announced  as  a  revelation  of  the  secrets  of  the 
order,  and  by  the  sale  of  which  he  expected  to 
make  a  good  deal  of  money.  Some  over-zealous 
and  misguided  fanatics  among  the  Masons,  learn 
ing  of  his  proposed  publication,  arrested  him  on 
a  frivolous  pretext,  hurried  him  from  place  to 
place,  and  at  last  procured  his  confinement  in  a 
deserted  fort  at  Niagara.  Here  he  utterly  dis 
appeared,  having  been,  if  one  may  trust  the  evi 
dence,  taken  off  in  a  boat  and  drowned  in  the 
waters  of  Lake  Ontario.  All  attempts  to  detect 
and  convict  the  authors  of  this  crime  were 
baffled  by  the  powerful  association  of  which 
they  were  members ;  but  there  was  no  anti- 
Masonic  party  in  any  locality  until,  in  the  sum 
mer  of  1827,  a  gentleman  who  had  been  the 
treasurer  of  the  town  of  Rochester,  ever  since 
its  incorporation,  and  to  whose  reelection  there 


FIRST  STEPS   IN  POLITICS.  13 

was  no  open  opposition,  was  beaten  at  the  polls 
by  a  candidate  whose  nomination  even  had 
been  previously  unknown.  For  this  political 
overturn  the  Freemasons  claimed  the  credit. 
The  defeated  officer  was  not  a  Mason  ;  he  had 
by  chance  been  an  eye-witness  of  something 
subsequently  shown  to  have  been  connected  with 
Morgan's  disappearance  ;  and  he  had  also  taken 
a  prominent  part  in  the  investigations  set  on 
foot  to  discover  the  criminals.  The  result  of 
this  petty  local  election,  and  the  consequent  ex 
ultation  of  the  Masons,  angered  the  people  of 
the  village  and  county,  and  in  the  autumn  anti- 
Masonic  candidates  were  nominated  and  elected 
to  the  state  assembly.  The  next  year  (1828) 
the  anti-Masons  extended  and  perfected  their 
political  organization  ;  they  obtained  control  of 
the  western  counties  of  New  York  ;  they  cap 
tured  some  isolated  towns  elsewhere,  and  at 
tracted  the  attention  of  the  public  throughout 
the  state.  They  held  a  convention,  nominated  a 
candidate  for  governor,  and  succeeded  in  choos 
ing  five  out  of  the  thirty  -two  state  senators 
and  seventeen  members  of  the  assembly.  The 
"  Anti-Masonic  Enquirer,"  Thurlow  Weed's 
paper,  had  a  circulation  not  merely  in  the 
western,  middle  and  northern  counties  of  New 
York,  but  in  some  parts  of  Pennsylvania  and 
Ohio.  There  was  no  eneral  state  election  in 


UNIVERSITY 


14  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

1829.  In  March,  1830,  the  "  Albany  Evening 
Journal "  was  established  as  an  anti-Masonic 
paper  under  Weed's  editorship  ;  and  a  national 
convention  of  the  party,  which  Seward  attended, 
was  held  at  Philadelphia  in  September. 

In  the  following  year  Seward  came  to  New 
England  for  the  first  time  in  his  life.  Arriving 
in  Boston  on  the  anniversary  of  Morgan's  ab 
duction,  he  went  to  the  anti-Masonic  committee 
room,  where  he  was  called  upon  to  speak,  and 
found  himself  to  his  surprise  "  preaching  pol 
itics  "  in  that  city.  He  visited  John  Quincy 
Adams  at  Quincy,  and  the  acquaintance  thus 
begun  ripened  into  a  warm  and  enduring  friend 
ship.  He  found  Mr.  Adams  an  anti-Masonic 
candidate  for  Congress,  "  intensely  engaged  in 
writing  a  bitter  polemic  against  Freemasonry." 
A  little  later  there  was  a  second  national  anti- 
Masonic  convention  at  Baltimore,  to  which 
Seward  was  also  a  delegate.  Here  chief  justice 
Marshall  occupied  a  seat  on  the  platform,  and 
William  Wirt  (who  had  been  Monroe's  attor 
ney-general)  was  nominated  as  a  candidate  for 
president.  It  was  known,  when  this  was  done, 
that  Henry  Clay  intended  to  be  a  presidential 
candidate;  but  he  had  already  expressed  him 
self  so  strongly  against  the  anti- Masons,  that 
his  nomination  by  them  was  impossible.  It  was 
certain,  therefore,  that  the  opposition  in  New 


FIRST  STEPS   IN  POLITICS.  15 

York  to  General  Jackson's  reelection  would  be 
divided,  and  it  was  feared  that  it  would  be  im 
possible  under  the  circumstances  to  carry  the 
state  against  him.  The  result  justified  this 
apprehension.  Jackson  had  in  New  York  a 
decisive  majority,  and  both  in  the  electoral  col 
lege  and  in  the  country  made  considerable  gains 
over  his  vote  of  four  years  before.  Clay  sus 
tained  an  overwhelming  defeat.  Wirt  received 
only  the  four  electoral  votes  of  Vermont.  The 
two  parties  representing  the  opposition  were 
utterly  crushed,  and  Jackson's  removal  of  the 
government  deposits  from  the  United  States 
Bank  in  the  following  year  failed  to  reanimate 
either  of  them  in  New  York.  The  anti-Masons 
sent  only  nine  members  to  the  assembly,  as 
against  thirty-five  the  year  before,  and  at  a  con 
ference  of  the  leaders  in  December,  1833,  it 
was  unanimously  agreed  that  the  party  was  at 
an  end. 

The  anti-Masonic  party  owed  its  origin  and 
its  strength  to  the  conviction  of  the  leading 
young  men  of  western  New  York  that  the  ex 
istence  of  a  secret  society,  whose  members  were 
bound  to  one  another  by  an  obligation  which  had 
been  able  to  paralyze  the  exertions  of  counsel, 
to  shut  the  mouths  of  witnesses  or  compel  them 
to  perjure  themselves,  to  unnerve  the  arm  of 
justice  and  to  override  and  corrupt  all  depart- 


16  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ments  of  the  government,  was  inconsistent  with 
the  safety,  and  even  threatened  the  existence,  of 
a  popular  government.  Many  men  of  distinc 
tion,  ability,  and  experience  shared  these  views, 
and  supported  the  party ;  among  them  were 
Chief  Justice  Marshall  and  Judge  Story,  John 
Quincy  Adams,  Calhoun,  William  Henry  Harri 
son,  Richard  Rush,  and  Edward  Everett.  The 
extent  of  their  feeling  about  the  matter  may  be 
judged  from  the  fact  that  ex-President  Adams 
and  Judge  Story  seriously  considered  whether 
such  secrecy  as  there  is  about  the  college  Greek- 
letter  societies  ought  not,  on  public  grounds,  to 
be  prohibited. 

A  national  party,  however,  could  not  be  built 
up  on  a  solitary  instance  either  of  the  open 
defiance  or  secret  evasion  of  the  law  in  one 
section  of  a  single  state.  Though  the  popular 
excitement  in  New  York  and  the  neighboring 
states  caused  by  the  Morgan  affair  was  natural, 
yet  in  their  attacks  upon  the  Masonic  orders 
the  anti-Masons  overlooked  for  the  time  the  be 
nevolent  purposes  of  the  organization,  and  ap 
plied  to  it  a  general  proposition,  that,  "  Secret 
societies,  composed  of  members  bound  together 
by  unlawful  oaths,  and  extended  over  the  whole 
land,  are  opposed  to  the  genius  of  our  govern 
ment,  subversive  of  the  laws,  and  inconsistent 
with  private  rights  and  the  public  welfare." 


FIRST  STEPS   IN  POLITICS.  17 

Seward  joined  the  anti-Masons,  as  he  himself 
says,  because  he  thought  them  the  only  political 
organization,  having  any  life,  which  was  opposed 
to  Jackson,  Calhoun,  and  Van  Buren,  three 
political  leaders  whose  policy  seemed  to  him  to 
involve  "  not  only  the  loss  of  our  national  sys 
tem  of  revenue,  and  of  enterprises  of  state  and 
national  improvement,  but  also  the  future  dis 
union  of  the  states,  and  ultimately  the  universal 
prevalence  of  slavery."  It  was  as  the  represen 
tative  of  this  short-lived  but  vigorous  party  that 
he  made  his  entrance  into  public  office,  being 
elected  in  the  autumn  of  1830  to  the  senate  of 
the  state. 

The  New  York  senate  at  that  time  consisted 
of  only  thirty-two  members,  each  chosen  for  four 
years,  their  terms  expiring  in  rotation,  so  that 
neither  the  whole  senate  nor  more  than  one 
member  from  a  district  was  changed  in  any  one 
year.  Seward,  when  he  took  his  seat  there  in 
January,  1831,  was  only  twenty-nine  years  old, 
small  and  slender,  with  blue  eyes,  light  sandy 
hair,  a  smooth  face,  and  a  youthful  air  and  ex 
pression  which  made  him  appear  even  younger 
than  he  was.  He  was  one  of  a  very  small  minor 
ity,  the  majority  being  all  members  of,  or  de 
pendent  on,  the  Albany  Regency,  the  all-powerful 
central  force  of  the  New  York  Democracy.  He 
had  had  no  previous  experience  in  public  affairs, 


18  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

while  nearly  all  his  fellow  -  senators  were  not 
only  older  and  more  mature,  but  were  familiar 
with  their  position  and  its  labors  ;  and  he  was 
for  a  time  diffident,  embarrassed  and  silent.  His 
first  set  speech  was  an  argument  for  a  reform 
in  the  militia  system ;  the  changes  he  then  ad 
vocated  were  afterwards  substantially  adopted, 
and  their  value  was  shown  in  the  prompt  re 
sponse  of  New  York  to  President  Lincoln's  call 
for  troops  in  April,  1861.  The  closing  passage 
of  this  maiden  speech  of  Seward's,  though  it 
may  have  been  a  mere  rhetorical  flight,  has 
about  it,  in  view  of  later  events,  a  curious,  pro 
phetic  ring,  when  he  speaks  of  "  the  military 
spirit  which  brought  the  nation  into  existence, 
and  will  be  able  to  carry  us  through  the  dark 
and  perilous  ways  of  national  calamity  yet  un 
known  to  us,  but  which  must  at  some  time  be 
trodden  by  all  nations." 

During  his  term  in  the  senate,  he  was  an 
earnest  supporter  of  the  first  law  passed  in  New 
York  abolishing  imprisonment  for  debt  except 
in  cases  of  fraud ;  and  an  early  and  strenuous 
advocate  for  the  enactment  of  general  laws,  — 
such  as  are  now  found  in  the  statute  books  of 
most  states,  —  giving  to  all  citizens  the  right  to 
form  business  corporations,  instead  of  creating 
them  as  a  favor  by  special  charter. 

At  this  time,  and  down  to  the  adoption  of  the 


FIRST  STEPS   IN  POLITICS.  19 

constitution  of  1846,  the  senate  of  New  York 
was  not  merely  a  branch  of  the  legislative  de 
partment,  it  had  also  judicial  functions,  and  like 
the  English  House  of  Lords  was  the  court  of 
last  resort ;  and  a  considerable  portion  of  Sew- 
ard's  time  was  taken  up  by  his  judicial  labors. 
The  work  was  excellent  professional  training; 
he  was  interested  in  it,  and  discharged  its  duties 
conscientiously. 

In  the  summer  of  1833,  Seward,  at  his  father's 
invitation,  accompanied  him  to  Europe.  The 
account  of  his  travels  has  no  novelty  or  especial 
interest  to-day,  aside  from  a  little  visit  which 
he  made  to  Lafayette  at  La  Grange.  He  re 
turned  in  season  for  his  last  winter's  work  as. 
senator. 

The  presidential  election  of  1824  had  been 
purely  a  personal  contest.  No  one  of  the  series 
of  resolutions  recommending  the  various  candi 
dates  suggested  any  difference  in  their  political 
opinions ;  and  though  in  the  campaign  of  1828 
the  friends  of  Jackson  attacked  President  Ad 
ams's  position  on  the  tariff,  and  on  questions  of 
internal  improvements,  no  distinction  could  be 
drawn  between  Jackson  and  the  President  on 
these  points,  since  Jackson  had  voted  for  all  the 
measures  of  the  kind  that  Adams  supported. 
Jackson's  first  term  was  characterized  by  discus 
sions  and  divisions  as  to  the  tariff  and  internal 


20  WILL  1 AM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

improvements,  and  by  the  opening  of  his  attack 
on  the  United  States  Bank.  Before  his  second 
election  a  convention  of  the  young  men  of  the 
National  Republican  party  adopted  a  series  of  res 
olutions,  declaring  adequate  protection  to  Amer 
ican  industry  to  be  indispensable  to  the  pros 
perity  of  the  country,  and  a  uniform  system  of 
internal  improvements,  sustained  and  supported 
by  the  general  government,  to  be  an  important 
security  for  the  harmony,  strength  and  perma 
nency  of  the  republic.  Yet  it  might  fairly  be 
said,  taking  the  whole  country  together,  that  the 
question  of  personal  loyalty  to  Jackson  entered 
into  the  campaign  of  1832  at  least  as  largely 
as  any  matter  of  public  policy.  The  union  of 
the  opposition,  which  was  divided  into  National 
Republicans  and  anti- Masons,  would  not  have 
changed  the  result.  Jackson's  majority  author 
ized  him,  as  he  thought,  to  carry  on  a  personal 
government  for  the  next  four  years  and  to  make 
war  in  such  a  way  as  seemed  to  him  effectual, 
without  regard  to  constitutional  or  legal  limita 
tions,  upon  any  policy  or  institution  which  he 
disbelieved  in,  or  which  was  supported  by  men 
who  withstood  his  imperious  will.  The  opposi 
tion,  demoralized  and  disheartened  by  its  over 
whelming  defeat  in  1832,  so  far  rallied  two 
years  later  as  to  unite  in  the  formation  of  the 
Whig  party,  the  fundamental  articles  of  whose 


FIRST   STEPS   IN  POLITICS.  21 

political  creed  were  the  support  of  a  policy  of 
internal  improvements,  protection  to  American 
industry  and  a  national  bank. 

Of  this  new  party  Seward  was  the  candidate 
for  governor  in  1834.  He  failed  of  an  election, 
and  returning  to  Auburn  resumed  the  practice 
of  the  law.  His  four  years  in  the  state  senate 
had  strengthened  him  in  every  way ;  the  life  had 
enlarged  his  horizon ;  the  constant  intercourse 
with  other  and  older  men  of  more  experience 
than  himself,  and  discussions  in  public  and  pri 
vate,  had  developed  him ;  his  position  as  a  judge 
not  merely  gave  him  the  opportunity  to  hear,  but 
required  him  to  listen  to  and  to  weigh  the  argu 
ments  of  all  the  leading  lawyers  of  the  state ; 
and  this  legal  work  was  on  a  higher  plane  than 
his  previous  practice  at  the  bar.  His  absence 
had  rather  improved  than  injured  his  standing 
as  a  lawyer,  and  he  was  at  once  full  of  business, 
and  soon  overworked.  The  summer  of  1835 
he  spent  in  traveling  for  the  benefit  of  his  wife's 
health. 

In  June,  1836,  he  became  the  agent  of  some 
gentlemen  who  had  purchased  of  the  Holland 
Company  its  lands  in  Chautauqua  county,  in  the 
extreme  southwest  of  the  state  of  New  York. 
The  settlers  on  these  lands  were  to  pay  for  them 
by  installments,  and  only  received  their  deeds 
when  the  final  payments  were  made.  The  gen- 


22  WILLIAM  HENRY    SEWARD. 

tlemen  for  whom  Seward  was  acting  bought  the 
rights  of  the  Holland  Company  in  these  lands, 
and  then  got  into  difficulties  with  the  settlers, 
who  were  refusing  to  pay  and  were  fast  becoming 
disorderly  and  dangerous.  To  deal  with  them  re 
quired  both  firmness  and  forbearance,  good  sense, 
tact,  kindness  of  heart  and  manner,  and  an  evi 
dent  disposition  to  do  exact  justice.  The  work 
necessitated  a  more  or  less  prolonged  residence 
in  the  county,  and  was  Seward's  most  engross 
ing  occupation  until  his  nomination  and  election 
as  governor  by  the  Whigs  of  New  York,  in  the 
autumn  of  1838. 


CHAPTER  II. 

GOVERNOR   OF  NEW   YORK. 

THE  Chautauqua  affairs  had  been  so  far  settled 
in  the  previous  year  that  the  financial  crisis  of 
1837  did  not  affect  them,  and  Seward  thought 
himself  free  from  all  personal  and  business  anx 
ieties  when  he  entered  upon  his  duties  as  gov 
ernor.  His  election  meant  a  revolution  in  New 
York  politics.  For  forty  years  there  had  been 
no  governor  who  was  not  a  Democrat ;  but 
though  the  Whigs  had  now  carried  the  state,  the 
senate  was  still  Democratic,  and  could  control 
both  the  legislation  and  appointments  to  office. 
It  was  not  till  1840  that  Seward's  own  party 
had  command,  and  in  the  last  year  of  his  second 
term  he  was  again  confronted  by  a  hostile,  not 
to  say  vindictive,  majority  in  both  branches  of 
the  legislature. 

During  his  four  years  as  governor,  the  state 
spent  many  millions  in  public  improvements. 
The  Erie  canal  was  enlarged,  new  canals  were 
built,  and  state  aid  was  given  to  railways  and 
other  similar  enterprises.  For  only  a  small  part 
of  this  legislation  were  the  Whigs  really  respons- 


24  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ible.     Most  of  it  they  received  as  an  inheritance 
from  their  Democratic  predecessors.1 

The  Erie  canal  was  De  Witt  Clinton's  scheme, 
and  its  success,  from  the  outset,  was  so  over 
whelming  that  it  is  not  strange  that  it  gave  rise 
to  all  sorts  of  similar  schemes,  of  varying  merit 
and  demerit.  Seward  was  an  ardent,  perhaps 
an  indiscriminate  advocate  of  all  these.  He  be 
lieved  in  internal  improvements,  in  constructing 
either  by  tne  state  itself,  or  with  the  aid  of  the 
state,  all  manner  of  ways  of  communication  by 
land  and  by  water,  railways  and  canals,  from 
north  to  south,  from  east  to  west,  between  tide 
water  and  the  lakes,  through  the  great  valleys 

1  Seward  says,  That  of  the  state  debt  of  $30,000,000,  in 
1844,  all  but  about  $4,000,000  originated  under  Democratic  ad 
ministrations  ( Works,  iii.  p.  365) ;  and  Hammond,  the  historian 
of  New  York,  and  a  Democrat,  admits  that  most  of  the  debt 
was  contracted  and  sanctioned  by  Democratic  legislatures  and 
governors ;  though  he  explains  that  they  were  forced  to  do  this 
in  order  to  keep  their  power,  as  the  people  were  so  eager  for 
public  works  that  they  would  have  brought  in  the  Whigs,  had 
the  Democracy  shown  any  faltering  in  promoting  them.  In  a 
letter  of  January  30,  1844,  Seward  writes :  "  With  unimpor 
tant  exceptions  every  one  of  these  contracts  was  made  by  the 
statesmen  who  now  disavow  and  disown  them.  .  .  .  The  same 
statesmen  who  now  denounce  these  works  (the  enlargement 
of  the  Erie  Canal  and  the  New  York  and  Erie  Kailroad)  are 
the  same  persons  who  called  the  latter  enterprise  into  exist 
ence  by  a  loan  of  $3,000.000.  An  intervening  administration 
[his  own]  added  no  new  enterprise,  and  only  executed  the  con 
tracts  which  it  found  in  existence."  Works,  iii.  pp.  392,  393. 


GOVERNOR   OF  NEW    YORK.  25 

of  central  New  York,  to  the  coal  and  iron  fields 
within  and  on  her  borders.  Some  of  the  works 
which  he  favored  may  have  been  premature ;  he 
may  have  crowded  and  hurried  them  more  than 
the  finances  of  the  state  would  warrant;  some 
may  not  have  been  in  themselves  good  paying 
investments  ;  but  the  policy  which  inaugurated 
and  fostered  them  was  broad  and  far-sighted, 
and  they  one  and  all  have  enabled  the  state  to 
reap  the  full  benefit  of  its  admirable  geographi 
cal  situation,  and  have  helped  to  make  the  city 
of  New  York  the  seaboard  metropolis  of  the 
New  World. 

The  necessity  of  public  education  in  a  com 
munity  governed  by  universal  suffrage  was  a 
cardinal  article  of  Seward's  political  faith,  and 
he  was  earnest  in  season  and  out  of  season  in 
his  endeavors  to  extend  and  develop  the  school 
system  of  New  York.  He  saw  the  reluctance 
of  the  Roman  Catholics  to  send  their  children 
to  public  schools  not  under  their  own  control 
and  where  the  peculiar  tenets  of  their  faith  were 
not  taught.  For  this  and  other  reasons,  he  ad 
vocated  the  substitution  of  new  school  boards  in 
the  city  of  New  York  in  the  place  of  the  close 
corporation,  the  "  Committee  of  Public  Instruc 
tion,"  a  body  exclusively  Protestant,  which  had 
the  entire  control  .of  its  schools  and  school  funds. 
He  also  earnestly  recommended  that  sectarian 


26  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

or  parochial  schools  should  receive  a  share  of  the 
public  money  devoted  to  educational  purposes. 
His  support  of  the  first  of  these  measures  drew 
upon  him  the  hostility  of  many  of  his  party  in 
New  York  city ;  while  his  repeated  recommen 
dations  of  the  latter  policy  alienated  large  bodies 
of  Protestant  voters.  His  suggestions  of  changes 
in  legal  procedure  and  practice,  to  lessen  the 
delays  and  diminish  the  expense  of  litigation, 
were  not  favorably  received  by  the  bench  or 
bar;  and  the  opposition  to  him  upon  these  vari 
ous  grounds,  to  say  nothing  of  the  hostility  of 
the  disappointed  office-holders  and  their  friends, 
caused  the  reduction  of  his  personal  majority  in 
1840,  and  contributed,  with  other  national  and 
more  general  causes,  to  the  total  overthrow  of  the 
Whig  party  in  New  York  in  the  autumn  of  1842. 
During  his  public  service  as  governor,  the 
charities  of  the  state  found  in  him  a  warm 
friend ;  and  its  lunatic  asylum  almost  owed  to 
him  its  existence.  The  records  of  his  pardon 
papers,  so  far  as  they  have  been  printed,  are  a 
most  honorable  testimony,  not  merely  to  the 
humanity  and  good  sense  which  he  brought  to 
bear  on  each  particular  case,  but  to  the  sound 
principles  which  governed  him  in  the  exercise  of 
this  high  prerogative,  and  which  are  so  often 
neglected  for  the  less  creditable  reasons  of  im 
portunity  and  influence. 


GOVERNOR   OF  NEW    YORK.  27 

In  the  distribution  of  offices  he  simply  followed 
the  then  well-established  New  York  custom. 
For  at  least  a  quarter  of  a  century  before  Seward 
was  governor,  "  the  cohesive  power  of  public 
plunder  "  had  been  the  strongest  bond  of  union 
among  the  member^  of  the  different  factions 
who  had  followed  the  banner  of  one  or  the  other 
of  the  political  leaders  ;  and  it  was  a  well-settled 
rule  of  practice,  long  before  it  was  formulated 
by  a  New  York  senator  as  a  political  axiom, 
that  "  to  the  victors  belong  the  spoils."  Fifty 
years  of  added  experience  may  enable  us  to 
criticise  and  repudiate  this  doctrine,  from  whose 
disastrous  consequences  we  suffer  daily  in  nearly 
every  department  of  our  administration,  from 
that  of  the  humblest  messenger  in  our  smallest 
municipalities  to  the  most  important  posts  in  our 
national  government.  But  a  half  century  ago 
"  civil  service  reform  "  would  have  been  an  in 
comprehensible  phrase,  not  merely  to  politicians 
but  to  the  people,  and  Seward  was  in  this  respect 
no  wiser  than  his  generation.  He  expected  from 
those  whom  he  appointed  to  office  absolute  and 
unquestioning  support.  When  a  lawyer,  whom 
he  had  nominated  as  judge,  appeared  before  a 
legislative  committee  to  oppose  a  change  in  the 
management  of  the  public  schools,  recommended 
by  the  state  superintendent  of  education,  Sew 
ard  withdrew  the  nomination.  The  unsatisfac- 


28  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

tory  nature  of  the  spoils  system  did  not  fail, 
however,  to  impress  itself  upon  him.  He  says 
in  a  letter  :  "  The  list  of  appointments  made 
this  winter  is  fourteen  hundred,  for  all  of  which 
I  am  of  course  responsible,  while  in  many,  if  not 
most,  instances  the  circumstances  under  which 
the  nominations  were  made  left  me  without 
freedom  of  election.  ...  I  am  not  surprised 
by  any  manifestation  of  disappointment  or  dis 
satisfaction.  This  only  I  claim,  that  no  interest, 
passion,  prejudice  or  partiality  of  my  own  has 
controlled  any  decision  that  I  have  made." 
/  His  courage  and  good  temper  in  the  trying 
years  when  he  was  confronted  with  a  legislature 
where  his  political  opponents  were  in  a  majority 
in  either  one  or  both  branches  were  admirable. 
He  never  flinched  or  lost  his  self-control  before 
their  petty  insults  or  their  grosser  provocations, 
but  bore  them  with  perfect  apparent  equanimity, 
repelling  with  vigor,  when  necessary,  the  attacks 
made  on  him,  but  never  forgetting  his  personal 
self-respect  or  the  dignity  of  his  position. 

His  official  action  in  two  matters,  which  came 
before  him  as  governor,  excited  a  good  deal  of 
public  feeling  and  discussion.  The  first  of  these 
had  its  origin  in  the  Canadian  rebellion  of  1837. 
There  was  in  that  year  an  insurrection  in  Upper 
Canada,  in  which  the  Canadian  ringleaders  were 
largely  assisted  by  reckless  adventurers  from 


GOVERNOR   OF  NEW    YORK.  29 

northern  New  York,  a  party  of  whom  seized 
Navy  Island,  in  the  Niagara  River,  entrenched 
themselves  there,  and  manned  their  works  with 
cannon  stolen  from  the  New  York  state  arsenals. 
A  little  steamboat,  the  Caroline,  had  been  en 
gaged  to  bring  them  supplies.  At  the  end  of 
her  first  day's  employment  she  was  made  fast  to 
a  wharf  on  the  American  side  of  the  river,  and 
within  the  limits  of  the  state  of  New  York. 
Here  about  midnight  she  was  boarded  by  a 
band  of  loyal  Canadians,  set  on  fire,  cut  loose 
and  left  to  drift  over  the  falls.  There  was  no 
resistance.  The  men  on  the  steamer  were  asleep 
and  unarmed.  Some  of  them,  awakened  by  the 
attack,  jumped  ashore  ;  others  were  drowned. 
One  of  the  crew,  Durfee,  an  American,  was  shot 
and  killed  as  he  was  running  away. 

When  the  news  of  this  affair  reached  Wash 
ington,  the  secretary  of  state,  Mr.  Forsyth, 
wrote  to  the  British  minister,  complaining  of 
the  violation  of  our  territory,  and  saying  that  it 
would  form  the  subject  of  a  demand  for  redress. 
In  his  reply  the  British  minister  offered  as  an 
excuse  for  the  attack  the  "  piratical  character 
of  the  Caroline,  and  the  necessity  of  self-defense 
and  self-preservation  under  which  Her  Majesty's 
subjects  acted  in  destroying  her ;  the  temporary 
overthrow  of  the  ordinary  laws  by.  piratical  vio 
lence,  on  the  New  York  frontier ;  and  the  fact 


30  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

that  Her  Majesty's  subjects  in  Upper  Canada, 
having  already  severely  suffered  from  this  cause 
and  being  threatened  with  still  farther  injury, 
.  .  .  were  necessarily  impelled  to  consult  their 
own  security  by  pursuing  and  destroying  the 
vessel  wherever  they  might  find  her." 

After  this  despatch,  which  treated  the  matter 
as  an  act  of  private  violence  with  extenuating 
circumstances,  nothing  more  was  heard  on  the 
subject  from  the  British  government  for  three 
years,  except  the  acknowledgment  of  our  formal 
demand  for  an  apology  and  redress.  "  British 
interests,"  says  an  English  historian,  "  had 
apparently  been  secured  by  the  burning  of  the 
Caroline,  and  the  natural  susceptibilities  of  the 
inhabitants  of  the  United  States  seemed  hardly 
worth  consideration." 

In  November,  1840,  Alexander  McLeod,  a 
Canadian,  while  at  Lockport  in  New  York, 
boasted  that  he  had  been  one  of  the  party  at 
tacking  the  Caroline,  and  had  himself  shot 
Durfee.  He  was  thereupon  arrested  on  a  charge 
of  murder  and  arson. 

On  learning  of  his  arrest,  the  British  minister, 
Mr.  Fox,  who  had  previously  treated  the  affair 
as  the  unauthorized  act  of  private  individuals, 
and  rested  his  justification  of  it  upon"  the  neces 
sity  of  self-preservation,  which  had  impelled  the 
Canadians  for  their  own  security  to  pursue  and 


GOVERNOR    OF  NEW    YORK.  31 

destroy  the  steamer  wherever  she  might  be,  at 
once  took  the  opposite  ground,  and  demanded 
McLeod's  immediate  release  ;  because  the  "  de 
struction  of  this  steamboat  was  a  public  act  of 
persons  in  Her  Majesty's  service,  obeying  the 
orders  of  their  superior  authorities."  This  was 
the  first  official  suggestion  that  the  attack  on 
the  steamer  was  the  act  of  the  government ;  and 
in  making  it,  Mr.  Fox  was  speaking  without 
authority.  Forsyth  replied  that  the  matter  was 
now  in  the  hands  of  the  judiciary  of  New  York, 
and  beyond  the  President's  control.  In  Febru 
ary,  1841,  Lord  Palmerston,  then  secretary  of 
state  for  foreign  affairs,  wrote  to  Mr.  Fox, 
approving  his  course,  and  saying :  "  There  was 
never  a  matter  upon  which  all  parties,  Tory, 
Whig,  and  Kadical,  more  entirely  agreed.  If 
any  harm  should  be  done  to  McLeod,  the  in 
dignation  and  resentment  of  all  England  will  be 
extreme ;  the  British  nation  will  never  permit  a 
British  subject  to  be  dealt  with  as  the  people  of 
New  York  propose  to  deal  with  McLeod,  with 
out  taking  signal  revenge  upon  the  offenders ; 
McLeod's  execution  would  produce  war,  war 
immediate  and  frightful  in  its  character,  because 
it  would  be  a  war  of  retaliation  and  vengeance." 
In  this  dispatch  Lord  Palmerston  assumed  on 
behalf  of  Great  Britain  full  responsibility  for 
the  original  attack.  On  the  12th  of  March, 


32  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

1841,  the  British  minister  communicated  the 
substance  of  this  letter  to  Mr.  Webster,  who, 
on  the  change  of  administration,  had  become 
secretary  of  state  under  President  Harrison ; 
and  our  government  then  had  for  the  first  time 
an  authoritative  declaration  that  the  violation 
of  our  territory,  the  killing  of  Durfee,  and  the 
destruction  of  the  steamer,  with  the  incidental 
loss  of  life,  were  acts  done  under  orders  of  the 
Canadian  authorities,  which  England  justified 
and  assumed  as  her  own.  In  the  opinion  of  the 
administration  this  declaration  entirely  changed 
the  situation,  and  the  transaction  became  a 
national  affair.  Webster's  reply  to  Fox  was 
delayed  in  consequence  of  Harrison's  death.1 
Before  sending  it  he  had  learned  from  Cass, 
who  was  in  Paris,  that  while  McLeod's  execu 
tion  would  be  considered  a  casus  belli,  any  sen 
tence  short  of  this  would  not  have  that  effect. 
This  information,  however,  did  not  diminish  his 
eagerness  to  dispose  of  the  matter  at  once,  and 
he  advised  the  President  to  send  the  attorney- 
general  to  confer  with  Governor  Seward  upon 
the  new  aspect  given  to  the  affair  by  this  letter, 
and  to  urge  him  to  direct  the  prosecution  to  be 
discontinued,  and  McLeod  discharged.  Seward 
doubted  his  authority  to  interfere  with  the  case 
as  suggested;  and  in  view  of  the  popular  ex- 

1  He  died  April  4,  1841,  after  ten  days'  illness. 


GOVERNOR    OF  NEW    YORK.  33 

citement  thought  that  such  interference,  if  law 
ful,  would  be  extremely  injudicious.  He  was 
confident  that  the  people  would  acquiesce  in 
McLeod's  acquittal,  or  in  his  pardon,  if  con 
victed,  but  would  be  very  much  stirred  up  if  he 
were  released  in  the  exceptional  manner  pro 
posed.  For  these  reasons  he  declined  to  accede 
to  the  President's  suggestions;  though  he  as 
sured  the  attorney-general  that  he  would  pardon 
McLeod  if  he  were  convicted,  and  that  there 
should  be  no  execution  and  no  war.  This  did 
not  satisfy  Mr.  Webster,  and  in  reply  to  Pal- 
merston's  dispatch  he  suggested  that  McLeod 
should  apply  to  the  court  for  a  discharge  on 
habeas  corpus.  This  was  done.  The  federal 
administration,  against  Seward's  earnest  remon 
strances,  permitted  the  United  States  attorney, 
who  before  his  appointment  had  been  McLeod's 
counsel,  to  continue  to  act  for  him  ;  the  attorney- 
general  of  New  York  appeared  officially  011  the 
other  side,  and  the  proceedings  in  court  assumed 
in  this  way  the  aspect  of  a  controversy  between 
the  federal  government  on  one  side,  and  the 
state  government  on  the  other,  and  were  gen 
erally  so  regarded. 

As  McLeod's  application  for  his  discharge 
was  to  be  heard  in  the  city  of  New  York,  he 
was  taken  there  in  custody.  The  legislature 
was  in  session  when  he  passed  through  Albany. 


34  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

There  was  much  excitement,  and  an  outcry 
that,  by  collusion  between  the  governor  and 
the  United  States  authorities,  McLeod  was  to 
be  discharged  without  a  trial.  A  resolve  was 
passed  calling  for  all  the  documents  and  corre 
spondence  relating  to  the  case.  The  production 
of  the  papers  and  Seward's  accompanying  mes 
sage  showed  the  charge  of  collusion  to  be  abso 
lutely  groundless.  The  discharge  was  refused 
by  the  court.  McLeod  was  tried  in  October, 
and  acquitted  on  proof  of  an  alibi.1 

Seward  in  this  matter  was  upholding,  as  was 
his  official  duty,  the  sovereignty  of  the  State 
of  New  York.  Webster's  contention  was  that, 

1  The  comments  of  the  newspaper  press  on  the  court's 
refusal  to  discharge  McLeod  disclosed  a  distinct  difference 
between  the  Whigs  of  the  city  of  New  York  and  those  beyond 
the  Harlem  River.  Out  of  the  city  opinion  was  unanimously 
with  the  court ;  but  in  New  York  itself  nearly  as  unanimously 
against  it.  The  question  was  treated  as  an  issue  between  the 
state  of  New  York,  her  courts  and  governor  on  the  one  side, 
and  on  the  other  the  federal  administration,  represented  by 
Mr.  Webster  with  his  dominating  personality,  and  supported 
by  the  whole  weight  and  authority  of  the  United  States. 

The  public  questions  raised  in  this  case  were  novel ;  and 
though  later  writers  on  international  law  have  supported  Mr. 
Webster's  positions,  yet  at  the  time  so  eminent  a  jurist  as 
Lord  Lyndhurst  was  of  opinion  that  "  it  was  very  questionable 
if  the  Americans  had  not  right  on  their  side,"  and  that  "  in 
a  similar  case  in  England  they  would  be  obliged  to  try  the 
man,  and,  if  convicted,  nothing  but  a  pardon  could  save  him." 
—  Dana's  Wheaton,  p.  371 ;  Greville's  Journal,  Part  II.  vol.  i. 
p.  383. 


GOVERNOR    OF  NEW    YORK.  35 

after  Great  Britain's  admission  of  her  responsi 
bility,  the  case  should  be  at  once  ended  and 
McLeod  released,  either  by  an  order  of  the 
executive  discontinuing  the  prosecution,  or  by  a 
judgment  of  the  court,  discharging  him. 

The  New  York  court  decided  that,  as  peace 
existed  between  Great  Britain  and  the  United 
States,  at  the  time  of  the  burning  of  the  Caro 
line,  and  McLeod  was  merely  a  private  citizen, 
holding  no  commission  and  acting  under  no  pre 
vious  authority,  and  as  no  responsibility  for  his 
act  was  assumed  by  his  government  until  after 
he  had  been  arrested  and  the  court  had  acquired 
jurisdiction  of  the  case,  its  jurisdiction  was  not 
ousted  by  the  subsequent  admission  of  his  gov 
ernment,  and  the  case  should  proceed  in  the 
regular  way. 

What  had  been  done  in  New  York  after  Mc- 
Leod's  arrest  had  been  originally  approved  by 
Van  Buren's  administration,  and  Seward  felt 
keenly  the  treatment  he  had  received  at  the 
hands  of  its  successors,  the  representatives  of 
his  own  party.  Writing  to  a  friend  before  the 
trial,  he  says :  "  Nothing  could  have  been  more 
unkind  or  unwise  than  the  course  pursued  to 
wards  me  by  the  general  government  in  the 
McLeod  affair.  It  was  not  merely  unkind,  it 
was  ungenerous.  They  enjoyed  my  full  confi 
dence,  they  showed  me  none.  I  was  left  to  learn 


36  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

the  ground  taken  by  the  administration  from 
the  published  documents  accompanying  the 
President's  message.  ...  It  has  been  somewhat 
oppressive  upon  me  personally  to  have  Mr. 
Webster  roll  over  upon  us  the  weight  of  his 
great  name  and  fame  to  smother  me." 

The  matter  created  a  good  deal  of  feeling 
on  both  sides.  If  Seward  was  offended  at  his 
treatment  by  the  administration,  the  President 
and  Mr.  Webster  were  personally  irritated  both 
by  his  refusal  to  intervene,  and  by  the  failure  of 
the  attempt  to  obtain  McLeod's  immediate  dis 
charge  by  the  court.  There  were  public  grounds 
also  on  which  Mr.  Webster  wished  to  dispose 
of  the  affair  of  the  Caroline  as  speedily  and 
quietly  as  possible,  and  it  annoyed  him  that  the 
governor  of  New  York  would  not  yield  to  his 
judgment  and  cooperate  in  carrying  out  his 
wishes. 

Before  the  case  was  finally  disposed  of,  there 
was  a  change  of  government  in  England,  and 
shortly  afterwards  a  special  envoy  was  dispatched 
to  this  country  to  settle  various  matters  in  dis 
pute.  Among  these  was  the  affair  of  the  Caro 
line.  But  with  the  discharge  of  McLeod,  Great 
Britain  relapsed  into  the  same  indifference  as 
before  his  arrest,  and  it  was  with  difficulty  that 
Mr.  Webster  obtained  from  the  minister  a  state 
ment  that  "  it  was  perhaps  most  to  be  regretted 


GOVERNOR    OF  NEW    YORK.  37 

that  some  explanation  and  apology  for  this 
occurrence  was  not  immediately  made."  This 
doubtful  expression  of  regret,  and  careful  avoid 
ance  of  an  apology,  our  government  accepted  as 
sufficient  amends  for  the  invasion  of  our  terri 
tory  and  the  killing  of  our  citizens.  It  was  not 
a  triumph  of  American  diplomacy,  and  the  re 
sult  quite  justified  Lord  Palmer ston's  boast,  that 
"there  was  no  apology  for  the  Caroline  and 
should  be*  none." 

Whether  Seward  had  at  any  time  any  expec 
tation  of  going  into  Harrison's  cabinet,  or  any 
reason  for  such  expectation,  cannot  be  stated. 
A  letter  from  Harrison  to  Webster,  printed  in 
"  Webster's  Life  and  Correspondence,"  perhaps 
indicates  that  Webster  had  dissuaded  Harrison 
from  considering  Seward  for  any  cabinet  ap 
pointment,  and  that  Harrison  had  listened  to  his 
advice.  After  thanking  him  for  suggestions 
upon  this  matter,  Harrison  writes :  "  I  tell  you, 
however,  in  confidence,  that  I  have  positively 
determined  against  S.  There  is  no  considera 
tion  which  would  induce  me  to  bring  him  into 
the  cabinet.  We  should  have  no  peace  with 
his  intriguing,  restless  disposition."  It  would 
have  been  more  useful,  as  well  as  more  inter 
esting  if  Mr.  Webster's  biographer  had  either 
suppressed  both  letters,  or  published  the  one  to 
which  this  is  a  reply.  It  is  difficult  to  see  who 


38  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

the  mysterious  "  S  "  could  have  been  except 
Seward.  If  he  were  the  person  named,  it  is 
evident  that  Webster  had,  before  he  went  into 
Harrison's  cabinet,  an  opinion  of  Seward  by  no 
means  favorable,  which  may  partly  account  for 
the  tone  assumed  by  him  in  the  matter  of  Mc- 
Leod.  If  one  considers  also  that  the  McLeod 
matter  came  up  after  a  controversy  with  Vir 
ginia,  to  be  spoken  of  presently,  had  been  going 
on  for  two  years,  that  President  Tyler*  was  first 
and  always  a  Virginian,  and  that  his  personal 
animosity  to  Seward  at  that  time  and  down  to 
the  day  of  his  death  appears  everywhere  in  his 
biography,  it  is  possible  that  there  is  to  be 
found  here  an  additional  explanation  of  the 
arrogant  and  offensive  treatment  which  Seward 
received  at  this  time  at  the  hands  of  the  admin 
istration,  and  how  it  happened  that,  while  he 
gave  them  his  entire  confidence,  he  was  left  to 
learn  their  plans  and  policy  from  the  newspapers 
and  public  documents. 

A  controversy  with  Virginia,  growing  out  of 
a  demand  for  the  surrender  of  persons  charged 
with  aiding  in  the  escape  of  a  fugitive  slave, 
involved.  Seward  in  a  long  and  unpleasant  cor 
respondence  with  the  governor  of  that  state, 
gained  him  notoriety  and  odium  in  the  South,  a 
prominent  position  among  the  advanced  anti- 
slavery  Whigs  at  the  North,  and  induced  the 


GOVERNOR    OF  NEW    YORK.  39 

Abolitionists  to  endeavor  to  persuade  him  to 
join  their  ranks  and  accept  their  nomination  for 
president.  He  preferred,  however,  to  remain 
a  Whig,  believing,  as  he  always  insisted,  that 
there  could  be  only  two  great  parties  in  the 
country,  and  that  a  third  party  could  never  ac 
complish,  except  indirectly,  any  important  end. 
The  facts  of  the  case  were  simple  enough, 
and  the  statement  of  them  all  that  was  needed 
for  Seward's  justification.  As  he  was  leaving 
Albany  for  a  few  days'  absence  an  agent  of 
Virginia  appeared  with  a  requisition  for  two 
colored  men,  charged  with  stealing  a  slave. 
They  had  been  already  arrested  and  were  in  jail 
in  New  York.  Sewarcl  examined  the  affidavit 
on  which  the  application  was  founded,  pointed 
out  what  seemed  to  him  its  fatal  defects,  said 
that  he  should  hear  the  men  before  answering 
the  requisition,  and  would  attend  to  the  matter 
on  his  return.  Nothing  more  was  heard  from 
the  agent ;  but  a  month  later,  on  receiving  a 
letter  on  the  subject  from  the  acting  governor 
of  Virginia,  Seward  ascertained  by  an  official 
report  that  the  men  had  been  discharged  on 
habeas  corpus,  because  the  judge  before  whom 
they  were  brought  was  satisfied  upon  the  evi 
dence  that  "neither  of  them  had  committed 
an  offense  against  the  laws  of  Virginia."  A 
courteous  note  enclosing  this  report  would  seem 


40  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

to  have  been  the  dignified  and  proper  reply  to 
the  letter  from  Virginia  ;  but  instead  of  confin 
ing  himself  to  this,  Seward  voluntarily  embarked 
in  a  discussion  of  the  proper  construction  of  the 
constitutional  provision  for  the  surrender  of 
fugitives  from  justice,  insisting  that  it  applied 
only  to  offenses  recognized  as  crimes  by  the 
jurisprudence  of  all  civilized  nations,  or  to  acts 
made  criminal  by  the  laws  both  of  the  state 
demanding  and  of  that  assenting  to  the  sur 
render,  and  did  not  apply  to  acts  which  any  one 
state  chose  to  make  highly  penal,  but  which 
had  no  criminal  significance  in  another,  such 
as  assisting  in  the  escape  of  a  slave,  —  an  act 
inspired  by  the  spirit  of  humanity  and  of  the 
Christian  religion. 

O 

This  letter  gave  great  offense  to  the  authori 
ties  and  people  of  Virginia ;  it  was  considered 
an  insult  to  the  state,  a  wanton  attack  on  the 
peculiar  institution  upon  which  its  whole  social 
fabric  rested.  The  correspondence  was  continued 
through  more  than  two  years,  Seward's  letters 
alone  covering  seventy  printed  octavo  pages. 
Virginia  sent  copies  of  the  letters  to  the  other 
slave  states  and  asked  their  support ;  the  matter 
was  laid  before  her  legislature,  and  a  committee 
of  that  body  made  an  elaborate  report  upon  it. 
Her  governor  refused  to  surrender  to  New  York 
a  fugitive  charged  with  forgery  ;  and  when  the 


GOVERNOR    OF  NEW    YORK.  41 

legislature  disapproved  his  action,  he  resigned. 
The  lieutenant-governor  returned  the  alleged 
forger ;  but  the  Virginia  legislature,  by  way  of 
retaliation  for  Se ward's  conduct,  passed  a  law 
imposing  special  burdens  upon  vessels  coming 
from,  or  bound  to  New  York  ;  authorizing  the 
governor,  however,  to  suspend  its  operation, 
whenever  New  York  should  repeal  its  statute 
giving  alleged  fugitive  slaves  the  right  of  trial 
by  jury,  and  should  either  return  the  colored 
seamen  originally  demanded,  or  show  a  proper 
penitence  and  recant  its  constitutional  heresies. 

The  friends  of  each  governor  approved  his 
course,  and  praised  his  superior  skill  in  the  dis 
cussion.  All  Virginians,  of  whatever  party, 
thought  the  "  attitude,  conduct  and  ability  of 
Governor  Gilmer  was  in  every  way  a  match  for 
the  wily  arts  of  Seward."  But  New  York  was 
by  no  means  so  unanimous  in  its  support  of 
its  chief  magistrate.  "  The  controversy  has 
hitherto  been  much  more  ably  managed  by 
Seward  than  by  the  Virginians,"  writes  John 
Quincy  Adams,  in  his  diary,  "  but  there  have 
been  symptoms  of  the  basest  defection  to  the 
cause  of  freedom  among  the  New  York  Whigs, 
and  a  disposition  to  sacrifice  Seward  to  the 
South."  There  is  no  question  that,  at  the  time, 
this  correspondence  injured  Seward  with  his 
own  party.  The  Democratic  opinion  of  his  po- 


42  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

sition  was  expressed  in  a  joint  resolution  of  the 
New  York  legislature,  declaring  that  "  stealing 
a  slave,  contrary  to  the  laws  of  Virginia,  is  a 
crime,  within  the  meaning  of  the  constitution," 
and  requesting  the  governor  to  transmit  to  the 
executive  of  Virginia  a  copy  of  this  resolve. 
Seward  returned  the  resolution  with  a  message 
in  which  he  said :  — 

"  I  could  not  transmit  the  resolution  in  the 
present  case,  without  silently  acquiescing  therein, 
and  thus  waiving  a  decision  to  which  I  adhere, 
or  accompanying  the  communication  to  Virginia 
with  a  protest  of  my  dissent.  The  senate  and 
assembly  will,  therefore,  excuse  me  from  assum 
ing  the  duty  which  an  assent  to  their  request 
would  impose,  and  will,  if  it  be  proper,  select 
some  other  organ  of  communication  with  the 
executive  authorities  of  our  sister  common 
wealth." 

This  message  was  his  last  important  commu 
nication  to  the  legislature,  his  official  career  in 
New  York  ending  with  the  year. 


CHAPTER  III. 

PROFESSIONAL    LIFE.  —  SIX    YEARS   A    PRIVATE 
CITIZEN. 

WHEN  Seward  returned  to  Auburn  in  Jan 
uary,  1843,  he  had  some  reason  for  thinking,  as 
he  said,  that  his  public  career  was  closed.  The 
Whigs  in  the  country  were  as  badly  off  as 
a  political  party  well  could  be.  They  had 
elected  their  president  and  vice-president,  but 
the  former  had  died,  and  the  latter  vetoed  every 
measure  intended  to  carry  out  their  policy.  In 
New  York  the  Democrats  had  again  obtained 
entire  control  of  the  state  government,  and  for 
this  many  Whigs  held  Seward's  administration 
responsible.  He  was  blamed  for  the  state  debt, 
though  Democratic  legislation  had  created  it; 
his  Virginia  correspondence  had  alienated  con 
servatives  ;  his  course  in  the  McLeod  matter  had 
incurred  the  hostility  of  Webster's  friends ;  and 
his  views  about  the  distribution  of  the  school 
funds  had  given  much  dissatisfaction  to  Protest 
ants.  It  seemed,  therefore,  not  only  that  there 
was  no  prospect  of  success  for  his  party,  but  that, 
even  should  they  unexpectedly  carry  an  election, 


44  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

there  was  no  probability  that  any  public  service 
would  be  required  of  him.  It  was  perhaps  best 
for  him  that  he  felt  that  his  public  career  was 
closed,  for  the  condition  of  his  affairs  was  such 
as  to  require  all  his  attention,  and  he  was  glad 
to  think  that  he  was  still  young  enough  to 
"  repair  all  the  waste  of  his  private  fortune." 
During  his  term  as  governor  he  had  entirely 
neglected  his  own  business  matters,  and  had  spent 
more  than  his  income  ;  his  moderate  personal 
estate  had  been  nearly  consumed,  and  he  now 
found  himself  so  embarrassed  that  he  was  advised 
to  seek  the  benefit  of  the  bankrupt  act.  But  this 
he  refused  even  to  consider,  and  opening  his  old 
office  set  himself  to  work  to  earn  his  living  and 
pay  his  debts. 

Resuming  his  practice  with  a  local  action  of  the 
most  trifling  character,  the  circle  of  his  clients 
continually  widened  and  his  cases  increased  both 
in  number  and  importance ;  he  became  counsel 
for  the  owners  of  several  valuable  patents,  and 
in  a  few  years  was  able  to  write  to  his  wife : 
"  Every  day  since  my  retreat  from  public  life, 
the  profession  which  I  once  so  ungratefully 
despised  has  been  increasing  its  rewards,  until 
we  are  no  longer  pressed  by  fear  of  disaster  or 
sickness,  although  I  have  been  diverted  so  often 
and  so  long  from  lucrative  engagements.  Our 
boys  are  pleasantly  obtaining  an  education  which 


PROFESSIONAL   LIFE.  45 

is  a  better  patrimony  than  riches.  If  our  com 
forts  do  not  decrease,  and  our  children  have  no 
reason  to  complain  of  neglect,  we  shall  have 
passed  through  life  happier,  and  I  hope  die 
better,  than  we  should,  if  my  earliest  schemes  of 
wealth  had  been  accomplished." 

One  trial  in  which  he  took  part  at  this  time 
should  certainly  be  mentioned,  as  Seward's  con 
duct  in  it  exhibited  some  of  the  best  qualities  of 
his  character,  —  the  courage  and  tenacity  with 
which  he  pursued,  in  spite  of  threats  and  obloquy, 
a  course  which  his  conviction  of  right  and  his 
sense  of  humanity  dictated.  A  demented  negro 
named  Freeman,  just  out  of  the  state  prison  at 
Auburn,  killed,  without  the  slightest  provoca 
tion  and  with  revolting  brutality,  a  whole  family 
of  the  neighborhood.  He  was  arrested.  The 
people,  roused  to  a  pitch  of  frenzy,  were  with 
difficulty  restrained  from  lynching  him.  Seward 
was  away  at  the  time.  He  had  recently  been 
counsel  in  another  case  where  the  then  novel 
and  unpopular  defense  of  insanity  had  been  set 
up  and  maintained  by  him  with  some  success ; 
and  it  was  feared  he  might  be  induced  to  act 
for  Freeman.  Every  effort  was  made  to  pre 
vent  this.  To  quiet  the  popular  apprehensions 
on  this  point,  one  of  the  county  judges  publicly 
declared  that  no  Governor  Seward  would  inter 
fere  to  defend  Freeman;  and  Seward's  own 


46  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

law  partners  were  persuaded  to  confirm  this 
assurance,  while  threats  of  personal  violence, 
should  he  appear  for  the  defense,  were  freely 
made.  Seward,  on  his  return,  was  present  in 
court  when  the  poor  lunatic  was  brought  in  to 
be  arraigned  ;  he  had  no  counsel ;  and  thereupon, 
finding  no  other  lawyer  willing  to  defend  him, 
Seward,  though  he  had  full  knowledge  of  the 
popular  feeling  and  of  all  that  had  been  said 
and  done  as  to  his  appearance  in  this  case,  the 
threats  as  well  as  the  promises,  volunteered  to 
act  for  him.  It  is  not  necessary  to  repeat  the 
story  of  the  trial.  It  was  a  most  painful  mockery 
of  justice,  equally  discreditable  to  the  judge,  the 
prosecuting  counsel  and  the  jury.  Seward  was 
uniformly  treated  by  them  all  during  its  progress 
as  a  person  who  was  prostituting  his  great  talents 
in  a  wicked  attempt  to  save  by  unlawful  means 
the  worst  of  criminals.  But  he  was  apparently 
unmoved  by  all  this.  He  bore  with  seeming 
composure  the  taunts  and  abuse  of  the  prosecut 
ing  attorney,  the  ill  manners  and  injustice  of  the 
court,  and  the  gibes  and  insults  of  the  people. 
The  arduous  and  painful  professional  duty  he 
had  undertaken  was  most  faithfully  discharged. 
His  closing  argument  was  exhaustive  and  con 
vincing.  The  insanity  of  Freeman  was  proved 
beyond  a  doubt.  But  conviction  was  a  foregone 
conclusion.  The  public  excitement  had  made 


PROFESSIONAL   LIFE.  47 

a  fair  trial  and  verdict  a  matter  of  difficulty. 
The  presiding  judge  did  not  hesitate  to  show 
that  he  shared  the  feelings  of  the  people,  and 
his  obvious  leaning  against  the  prisoner  and  his 
defense  made  any  unbiased  consideration  of  the 
case  by  a  jury  altogether  impossible.  A  higher 
court,  less  subject  to  local  pressure  and  the  tem 
porary  popular  frenzy,  set  aside  the  verdict  on 
Seward's  application,  and  ordered  a  new  trial ; 
but  before  that  could  take  place  the  poor  fellow's 
mania  had  so  developed  that  it  was  impossible 
to  try  him  again.  He  lived  only  a  short  time, 
and  the  examination  which  followed  his  death 
disclosed  an  organic  disease  of  the  brain,  from 
which  he  had  long  been  suffering. 

For  his  conduct  in  this  case,  Seward  was  at 
the  time  to  some  extent  proscribed.  "  I  rise 
from  these  fruitless  labors,"  he  wrote,  "  ex 
hausted  in  mind  and  in  body,  covered  with  pub 
lic  reproach,  stunned  with  protests."  Freeman's 
death,  however,  and  the  clear  proof  of  his  in 
sanity,  caused  a  revulsion  of  popular  feeling ; 
and  in  the  end,  and  perhaps  especially  with 
those  who  had  been  loudest  in  their  denuncia 
tions  of  him,  his  defense  of  Freeman  brought 
him  far  more  gain,  than  loss,  of  reputation. 

Though  he  was  not  again  a  candidate  for 
office  until  his  election  to  the  United  States 
Senate  in  1849,  declining  in  the  interval  every 


48  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

suggestion  of  a  nomination,  yet  lie  was  never  so 
absorbed  by  his  professional  labors  as  to  cease 
to  take  an  interest  in  politics.  Either  from  his 
own  choice,  or  because  he  was  out  of  favor  with 
his  party,  he  gave  little  time  to  public  affairs  in 
the  year  1843.  But  in  the  presidential  cam 
paign  of  1844  he  did  his  utmost  to  insure  the 
success  of  the  Whigs.  He  began  on  the  22d  of 
February  with  a  speech  at  Auburn  in  favor  of 
Clay,  who  was  then  recognized  as  the  Whig 
candidate,  though  it  was  not  till  May  that  the 
convention  ratified,  by  a  formal  vote,  the  nomi 
nation  already  made  by  the  people. 

In  this  election  there  was  but  one  real  issue, 
the  annexation  of  Texas.  Though  this  had  been 
vaguely  threatening  for  some  time,  no  scheme 
for  effecting  it  had  taken  any  definite  shape 
until  that  which  Tyler  had  sprung  upon  the 
country,  only  a  few  weeks  before  the  nominating 
conventions  of  the  different  parties  were  to  be 
held.  Adventurers  from  the  southern  states 
had  wrested  Texas  from  Mexico,  not  to  make  it 
an  independent  republic,  but  to  secure  its  an 
nexation  to  the  United  States  and  extend  the 
area  of  slavery.  There  were  many  intrigues  and 
secret  negotiations  during  the  earlier  years  of 
Tyler's  administration,  and  even  before  that ; 
but  no  decisive  step  was  taken  until  Calhoim 
became  secretary  of  state  in  March,  1844, 


PROFESSIONAL   LIFE.  49 

when  he  at  once  negotiated  a  treaty  of  annexa 
tion,  which  the  Senate  rejected  by  a  considerable 
majority.  While  it  was  under  consideration, 
both  the  great  parties  held  their  conventions. 
The  platform  of  the  Whigs  was  silent  as  to 
Texas  and  slavery,  though  Clay  had  declared 
himself  opposed  to  annexation.  The  Democrats 
threw  over  Van  Buren,  who  had  been  their  most 
prominent  candidate,  because  he  was  known  to 
be  against  annexation ;  they  nominated  James 
K.  Polk  of  Tennessee,  and  declared  "  the  re-an 
nexation  of  Texas  a  great  American  measure 
recommended  to  the  cordial  support  of  the 
Democracy  of  the  Union."  The  Liberty  party 
had  met  the  year  before  and  nominated  James 
G.  Birney,  with  a  platform  of  twenty-one  resolu 
tions  all  aimed  at  the  slave  system  of  the  South. 
During  the  summer,  as  the  canvass  went  on,  it 
became  evident  that  the  election  was  to  depend 
on  the  vote  of  New  York.  Whichever  of  the 
great  parties  could  carry  that  state  would  elect 
its  candidate.  The  Whigs  might  reasonably 
hope  to  do  this,  if  they  could  hold  the  radical 
anti-slavery  members  of  their  party,  and  induce 
them  to  support  the  regular  nominations  in 
stead  of  throwing  away  their  votes  on  Birney. 
Se ward's  advanced  anti-slavery  opinions,  and  his 
unhesitating  adherence  to  the  Whig  party  and 
its  candidates,  made  him  a  most  efficient  worker 


50  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

with  men  of  this  description,  who  were  opposed 
to  the  admission  of  Texas,  who  meant  to  re 
sist  it  by  their  votes,  and  wished  to  do  so  in 
the  most  effectual  manner  ;  and  he  spent  three 
months  in  campaign  labors  in  the  strongholds 
of  anti-slavery  opinion  in  northern  and  western 
New  York.  His  speeches  and  letters  were  of 
necessity  much  alike  in  substance,  however  they 
might  differ  in  form.  The  following  passages 
give  an  outline  of  his  principal  arguments  for 
the  support  of  the  Whig  candidates  :  — 

"  The  annexation  of  Texas  is  identical  with 
the  perpetuation  of  slavery.  Our  opponents  are 
for  it.  The  Whig  party  are  against  it.  If 
there  is  a  friend  of  human  freedom  willing  to 
follow  my  lead  in  this  sacred  cause,  I  appeal  to 
him  to  give  his  suffrage  to  the  Whig  candidates, 
not  for  the  sake  of  Henry  Clay,  nor  even  for 
the  sake  of  the  Whig  party,  but  for  our  coun 
try,  for  liberty's  sake,  and  for  the  sake  of  hu 
manity." 

"  What  will  Texas  cost  ?  It  will  cost  a  war 
with  Mexico,  an  unjust  war  —  a  war  to  extend 
the  slave  trade.  You  will  not  go  to  war  for  hu 
man  slavery,  will  you  ?  You  say  Henry  Clay  is 
a  slaveholder.  So  he  is.  I  regret  it  as  deeply 
as  you  do  ;  I  wish  it  were  otherwise.  But  our 
conflict  is  not  with  one  slaveholder,  or  with 
many,  but  with  slavery.  You  are  opposed  to 


PROFESSIONAL   LIFE. 

the  admission  of  Texas.  Will  you  resist  it  by 
voting  for  James  G.  Birney  ?  Your  votes  would 
be  just  as  effectual  if  cast  upon  the  waters  of 
the  placid  lake." 

"  Henry  Clay  is  opposed  to  the  coming  in  of 
Texas.  He  is  the  candidate  of  the  Whig  party. 
They  are  opposed  to  the  coming  in  of  Texas. 
The  security,  the  duration,  the  extension  of 
slavery,  all  depend  on  the  annexation  of  Texas. 
How,  then,  can  any  friend  of  emancipation  vote 
for  the  Texas  candidate,  or  withhold  his  vote 
from  the  Whig  candidate  ?  " 

"  The  integrity  of  the  Union  depends  on  the 
result.  To  increase  the  slaveholding  power  is 
to  subvert  the  constitution,  to  give  [this  power] 
a  fearful  preponderance,  which  probably  will  be 
speedily  followed  by  demands  to  which  the 
Democratic  free-labor  states  cannot  yield,  and 
which  will  be  made  the  ground  for  secession, 
nullification,  and  disunion." 

Before  the  convention  met  in  May,  Mr.  Clay 
had  written  a  letter  deprecating  either  urging  or 
opposing  annexation  on  sectional  grounds,  de 
claring  an  acquisition  of  territory  for  the  purpose 
of  strengthening  one  portion  of  the  country 
against  the  other  to  be  a  scheme  pregnant  with 
evil,  insisting  that  annexation  and  a  war  with 
Mexico  were  identical,  and  that  such  a  measure 
at  that  time  would  be  dangerous  to  the  integrity 


52  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

of  the  Union.  It  was  upon  this  letter  that  he 
was  nominated  and  that  the  Northern  Whigs 
were  asked  to  accept  his  position  on  the  Texas 
question  as  satisfactory.  But  in  August,  yield 
ing  to  the  pressure  of  Southern  Whigs  in  states 
which  he  could  not  possibly  carry,  he  wrote 
again :  "  So  far  from  having  any  personal  objec 
tion  to  the  annexation  of  Texas,  I  should  be 
glad  to  see  it,  without  dishonor,  without  war, 
with  the  common  consent  of  the  Union,  and 
upon  just  and  fair  terms."  The  news  of  this 
last  letter  reached  Seward  while  he  was  can 
vassing  New  York  on  Clay's  behalf ;  its  effect 
was  immediately  apparent :  "  I  met  that  letter 
at  Geneva,"  he  writes,  "  and  thence  here,  and 
until  now,  everybody  droops,  despairs.  It  jeop 
ards,  perhaps  loses  the  state.  Is  there  any  other 
way  but  to  go  through  to  the  end  more  devot 
edly  than  ever  ?  " 

He  followed  the  course  he  here  suggests, 
finishing  his  campaign  labors  with  no  apparent 
lack  of  zeal  or  courage,  but  with  an  inward 
conviction  of  the  coming  defeat.  His  exer 
tions,  however,  brought  him  one  satisfaction, 
the  restoration  to  some  extent  of  the  former 
harmonious  relations  between  the  conservative 
Whigs  of  the  city  of  New  York  and  himself; 
it  was  pleasant  to  him  to  recognize  this.  The 
causes  of  it  were  twofold.  The  mass  of  the 


PROFESSIONAL    LIFE.  53 

Whigs  had  moved  forward  to  where  Seward 
stood,  and  even  the  laggards  had  advanced 
much  nearer  his  position  ;  while  the  more  intelli 
gent  of  his  opponents  in  his  own  party  were 
becoming  aware  of  the  fact,  that  whatever  were 
his  hopes  or  beliefs  as  to  the  perfect  republic, 
he  endeavored  to  consider  and  deal  with  actual 
public  affairs  as  a  practical  statesman  rather 
than  a  Utopian  doctrinaire,  and  would  not  know 
ingly  sacrifice  a  possible  present  gain  to  a  remote 
and  uncertain  ideal. 

At  the  close  of  the  campaign  he  resumed  his 
professional  labors,  and  remained  until  the  next 
presidential  election  a  simple  looker-on  in  pol 
itics,  even  declining  a  nomination  to  the  consti 
tutional  convention  of  his  own  state. 

Detained  by  professional  business  at  Wash 
ington  during  several  weeks  in  the  next  three 
winters,  he  heard  there  much  talk  as  to  the 
political  questions  of  the  day,  —  the  matter  of 
the  Oregon  boundary,  which  was  in  dispute  be 
tween  this  country  and  Great  Britain,  the  Mexi 
can  war  and  the  Wilmot  proviso.  But  he  lis 
tened,  perhaps,  to  more  speculations  as  to  the 
possible  and  probable  candidates  for  the  next 
election,  and  by  March,  1847,  he  felt  that  Gen 
eral  Taylor's  nomination  and  election  scarcely 
admitted  of  a  doubt.  "  I  am  not  prepared  to 
speculate,"  he  writes,  "  upon  the  consequences 


54  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

of  events  so  great  and  unlocked  for  as  these. 
What  will  be  their  effect  upon  the  '  Great 
Question  of  Questions,'  which  underlies  all  pres 
ent  political  movements  ?  " 

When  the  nomination  was  actually  made,  he 
accepted  it  as  a  "result  inevitable,  if  not  the 
best  left  within  our  power  to  attain,"  and  took 
comfort  in  thinking  that,  "  if  the  Barnburners 
continued  the  conflict,  they  would  be  able  to 
save  the  state  for  the  Whi^s." 

O 

Before  the  convention  took  place,  Seward's 
name  had  been  suggested  for  the  vice -presi 
dency;  but  it  was  immediately  stated  that  he 
was  not  a  candidate.  Fillmore,  who  received 
the  nomination,  was  not  the  choice  of  Taylor's 
supporters,  but  was  a  concession  to  his  opponents ; 
and  Seward  at  once  predicted  that,  if  Fillmore 
were  elected,  that  portion  of  the  Whig  party  of 
the  state,  to  which  he  himself  belonged,  "  would 
be  in  the  position  of  a  faction  apparently  op 
posed  to  the  New  York  leader  in  the  general 
council  of  the  Whigs  of  the  Union,"  —  a  pro 
phecy  partially  realized  during  Taylor's  life,  and 
thoroughly  fulfilled  after  his  death. 

Before  the  Whig  convention  met,  General 
Cass  had  been  nominated  by  the  Democrats ; 
and  when  the  new  Free  Soil  party  had  selected 
Van  Buren  and  Adams  as  their  candidates,  the 
political  campaign  began. 


PROFESSIONAL   LIFE.  55 

In  1848  the  Whigs  repeated  the  experiment 
made  eight  years  before.  They  nominated  a 
military  hero,  admittedly  without  political  ex 
perience,  and  having  at  the  best  but  a  scanty 
equipment  of  political  knowledge  or  opinions. 
Their  convention  had  no  committee  on  resolu 
tions,  and  made  no  declaration  of  principles. 
The  Democrats  proclaimed  the  war  with  Mexico 
"  just  and  necessary;  "  and  the  Free  Soilers  de 
clared  for  "  no  more  slave  states  and  no  more 
slave  territory;"  but  for  "Free  Soil,  Free 
Speech,  Free  Labor  and  Free  Men." 

It  was  soon  evident  that  for  a  second  time  the 
election  was  to  depend  upon  the  fortunes  of  this 
new  third  party  in  the  pivotal  state  of  New 
York.  Would  it  catch  enough  anti- slavery 
Whig  votes  to  give  the  election  there  to  the 
Democrats ;  or  could  Van  Buren,  by  the  magic 
of  his  name,  his  personal  popularity  and  his 
political  skill,  seduce  from  their  allegiance  so 
many  Democrats  as  to  compass  the  defeat  of 
his  old  political  rival  and  enemy,  Cass  ?  Again, 
the  conduct,  the  position,  the  presence  and  the 
labors  of  Seward,  a  pronounced  anti-slavery 
man,  but  an  equally  emphatic  Whig,  were  all- 
important  to  his  party.  He  yielded  to  the  nu 
merous  demands  made  upon  him,  and  for  six 
weeks  or  more  spoke  constantly  in  New  York, 
New  England,  Pennsylvania,  New  Jersey,  Dela- 


56  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ware  and  Ohio.  In  Boston  lie  and  Abraham 
Lincoln  were  heard  together,  and  at  the  close  of 
the  evening  Lincoln  said  to  him :  "  I  have  been 
thinking  about  what  you  said  in  your  speech. 
I  reckon  you're  right.  We  have  got  to  deal 
with  this  slavery  question,  and  got  to  give  much 
more  attention  to  it  hereafter  than  we  have  been 
doing."  i 

Seward  wound  up  the  campaign  among  the 
anti-slavery  men  of  the  Western  Eeserve  in 
Ohio,  striving  to  persuade  them  to  cast  their 
votes  for  Taylor  rather  than  throw  them  away 
on  Van  Buren,  thereby  assuring  the  election  of 
Cass.  and  the  opening  to  slavery  of  the  territories 
just  wrung  from  Mexico.  His  friends  thought 
his  speech  at  Cleveland  the  most  bold  and  terse 
he  had  made,  .while  his  opponents  characterized 
it  as  the  most  perverse  and  dogmatic.  He  re 
vised  this  speech  for  publication,  thinking  "  it 
would  commend  itself  to  consideration."  A  short 
summary  of  it  will  show  his  views  of  the  issues 
between  the  parties,  and  of  the  duty  of  all  oppo 
nents  of  the  extension  of  slavery. 

He  saw  two  antagonistical  elements  of  society 
in  America  —  freedom  and  slavery.  These  ele 
ments  divided  and  classified  the  American  pet- 
pie  into  two  parties.  One  of  these,  — the  party 
of  slavery,  regarded  "disunion  as  amtng  the 
1  Seward,  Life,  ii.  p.  GO. 


PROFESSIONAL   LIFE.  57 

means  of  defense,  and  not  always  the  last  to  be 
employed."  The  other  maintained  that  the  pres 
ervation  of  the  union  of  the  states,  one  and  in 
separable,  now  and  forever,  was  the  highest  duty 
of  the  American  people  to  themselves,  to  pos 
terity  and  to  mankind.  "  The  party  of  slavery 
declares  that  institution  necessary,  beneficent, 
approved  of  God,  and  therefore  inviolable.  The 
party  of  freedom  seeks  complete  and  universal 
emancipation.  These  two  great  elements  exist 
and  are  developed  in  the  two  great  national  par 
ties  of  the  land."  Seward  did  not  contend  that 
the  evil  spirit  had  always  possessed  one  of  these 
parties  without  exception  or  mitigation,  and  that 
the  beneficent  one  had  on  all  occasions  fully 
directed  the  actions  of  the  other ;  but  he  insisted 
that  the  beneficent  spirit  had  worked  chiefly  in 
the  Whig  party,  and  its  antagonist  in  the  other 
party  ;  and  that  the  Whig  party  had  been  as  true 
and  faithful  to  human  freedom  as  the  inert  con 
science  of  the  American  people  would  permit  it  to 
be  ;  that  inert  as  that  conscience  was,  much  could 
be  done,  everything  could  be  done,  for  freedom. 
"  Slavery,"  he  said,  "  can  be  limited  to  its 
present  bounds,  it  can  be  ameliorated,  it  can  and 
must  be  abolished,  and  you  and  I  can  and  must 
do  it.  The  task  is  as  simple  and  easy  as  its 
consummation  will  be  beneficent  and  its  rewards 
glorious.  It  requires  only  to  follow  this  simple 


58  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

rule  of  action,  namely,  to  do  everywhere  and  on 
every  occasion  what  we  can,  and  not  to  neglect 
or  refuse  to  do  what  we  can  at  any  time,  because 
at  that  precise  time  and  on  that  particular  occa 
sion  we  cannot  do  more.  Circumstances  deter 
mine  possibilities.  When  we  have  done  our 
best  to  shape  them  and  make  them  propitious, 
we  may  rest  satisfied  that  superior  wisdom  has 
determined  their  form  as  they  exist,  and  will  be 
satisfied  with  us  if  we  then  do  all  the  good  that 
circumstances  leave  in  our  power.  But  we  must 
begin  deeper  and  lower  than  in  the  composi 
tion  and  combinations  of  factions  and  parties. 
Wherein  do  the  strength  and  security  of  slavery 
lie?  You  answer  that  they  lie  in  the  consti 
tution  of  the  United  States,  and  the  constitu 
tions  and  laws  of  all  slaveholding  states.  Not  at 
all.  They  lie  in  the  erroneous  sentiment  of  the 
American  people.  Constitutions  and  laws  can 
no  more  rise  above  the  virtue  of  the  people  than 
the  limpid  stream  can  climb  above  its  native 
spring.  Inculcate,  then,  the  love  of  freedom  and 
the  equal  rights  of  man  under  the  paternal  roof  ; 
see  to  it  that  they  are  taught  in  the  schools  and 
in  the  churches  ;  extend  a  cordial  welcome  to  the 
fugitive  who  lays  his  weary  limbs  at  your  door, 
and  defend  him  as  you  would  your  paternal  gods ; 
correct  your  own  error,  that  slavery  has  any  con 
stitutional  guaranty  which  may  not  be  released 


PROFESSIONAL    LIFE.  59 

and  ought  not  to  be  relinquished.  Say  to  slavery, 
when  it  shows  its  bond  and  demands  the  pound 
of  flesh,  that  if  it  draws  one  drop  of  blood  its 
life  shall  pay  the  forfeit.  Inculcate  that  free 
states  can  maintain  the  rights  of  hospitality  and 
humanity ;  that  executive  authority  can  forbear 
to  favor  slavery ;  that  Congress  can  debate,  that 
Congress  can  at  least  mediate  with  the  slave- 
holding  states ;  that  at  least  future  generations 
might  he  bought  and  given  up  to  freedom.  .  .  . 
Do  all  this,  and  inculcate  all  this  in  the  spirit  of 
moderation  and  benevolence,  and  not  of  retalia 
tion  and  fanaticism,  and  you  will  soon  bring  the 
parties  of  the  country  into  an  effective  aggres 
sion  on  slavery.  Whenever  the  public  mind  shall 
will  the  abolition  of  slavery,  the  way  will  open 
for  it.  I  know  that  you  will  tell  me  that  all  this 
is  too  slow.  Well,  then,  go  faster  if  you  can, 
and  I  will  go  with  you ;  but  .  .  .  remember 
that  no  human  work  is  done  without  prepara 
tion,  that  God  works  out  his  sublimest  purposes 
among  men  with  preparation." 

If  the  closing  passages  of  this  speech,  which 
have  just  been  quoted,  did  not  indicate  a  new 
departure  in  what  Seward  considered  the  politi 
cal  aims  of  the  Wrhig  party,  they  certainly  stated 
these  aims  with  clearness  and  emphasis,  and  are 
in  marked  contrast  with  the  absolute  silence  of 
its  platform  on  the  subject  of  slavery.  The  mass 


60  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

of  the  anti-slavery  Whigs  at  the  North,  though 
opposed  to  the  extension  of  slavery,  were  not 
emancipationists,  and  had  by  no  means  reached 
Seward's  position  as  declared  in  this  speech. 
The  large  majority  of  them  who  were  not  poli 
ticians  voted  for  Taylor,  slaveholder  though  he 
was,  on  the  grounds  upon  which  Seward  advised 
it,  —  that  the  Whig  party  was,  after  all,  the 
party  of  freedom,  and  the  personal  question  a 
subordinate  one,  and  that  it  would  be  almost 
impossible  to  regain  for  freedom  what  would  be 
lost  by  a  Democratic  victory. 

Seward  had  no  special  gifts  of  voice  or  pres 
ence.  He  was  below  the  average  height,  with 
nothing  commanding  in  his  appearance,  and  his 
voice  was  harsh  and  shrill ;  but  there  was  a 
courage,  an  earnestness  about  his  campaign 
speeches  of  this  year,  which  made  them  most 
effective  at  the  time,  and  a  tone  of  conviction, 
which  still  vibrates  as  one  reads  them  after  the 
lapse  of  nearly  half  a  century. 

He  returned  home  the  night  before  the  elec 
tion.  The  next  morning  it  seemed  probable 
that  the  Whigs  had  carried  New  York ;  in  a 
week's  time  Taylor's  election  was  ascertained 
beyond  a  doubt. 

The  campaign  over,  Seward  turned  again  to 
the  law,  and  was  busily  engaged  with  his  cases. 
But  though  he  wrote  on  the  16th  of  November : 


PROFESSIONAL   LIFE.  61 

"  Now  that  I  have  got  into  the  law  again  pretty 
deep,  I  care  nothing  for  these  [political]  in 
trigues,"  —  yet  it  cannot  be  doubted  that  he  took 
a  lively  interest  in  the  canvass  for  the  United 
States  Senate,  which  his  friends  were  making 
on  his  behalf,  and  which  his  opponents  in  his 
own  party  were  fighting  by  the  publication  of 
anonymous  pamphlets,  forged  letters,  and  the 
manufacture  of  fictitious  interviews.  As  often 
happens  in  such  cases,  these  inventions  returned 
only  to  plague  the  inventors,  and  on  the  6th  of 
February,  1849,  Seward  was  chosen  Senator 
from  New  York. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THE   COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS. 

IN  the  four  and  a  half  years  between  Folk's 
election  and  Taylor's  inauguration,  the  policy 
of  the  slave  states  had  become  distinctly  devel 
oped,  and  the  political  dogmas  of  their  lead 
ing  statesmen  clearly  formulated.  In  1845  they 
refused  to  admit  Iowa,  which  had  a  sufficient 
population,  unless  Florida,  deficient  in  numbers, 
should  be  brought  in  as  a  state  under  the  same 
bill.  In  1848  Wisconsin  came  in  as  a  counter 
poise  to  Texas  and  the  great  acquisitions  of  the 
Mexican  war,  which  were  then  expected  to 
inure  to  the  benefit  of  the  South  and  slavery. 

In  the  closing  days  of  Tyler's  administration, 
a  joint  resolution  for  the  annexation  of  Texas 
had  been  passed  by  the  expiring  Congress,  and 
received  the  President's  signature.  Before  the 
middle  of  January,  1846,  Polk  ordered  Taylor 
to  advance  into  Mexico,  and  our  war  of  inva 
sion  began.  In  the  following  winter,  while  the 
war  was  still  in  progress  (February  19,  1847), 
Calhoun  offered  in  the  Senate,  and  supported 
by  an  elaborate  speech,  resolutions  declaring  in 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  63 

substance  that  slavery  was  national,  freedom 
sectional ;  that  the  Constitution  authorized  and 
protected  slavery  in  all  the  national  domain, 
and  that  neither  Congress  nor  any  territorial 
legislature  could  legally  prevent  a  citizen  of  a 
slave  state  from  migrating  with  his  slaves  to  any 
territory  and  there  holding  them  in  servitude. 

During  the  Mexican  war  the  territory  which 
was  ceded  to  us  by  treaty  at  its  close  had  been 
occupied  by  our  troops  and  governed  by  the 
officers  in  command  of  them,  who  treated  the 
laws  of  Mexico  as  still  in  force,  so  far  as  the 
civil  rights  and  obligations  of  the  people  were 
concerned.  With  the  peace,  the  military  author 
ity  properly  ceased  ;  and  President  Polk  ear 
nestly  recommended  Congress^  to  provide  some 
government  as  a  substitute.  For  California 
this  was  an  imperative  need,  for  directly  the 
discovery  of  gold  was  known,  hordes  of  adven 
turers  of  every  description  had  rushed  in,  and 
it  was  absolutely  necessary  that  there  should 
be  some  authority  to  repress  and  punish  with 
a  strong  hand  the  disorderly  and  vicious,  and 
protect  the  honest  and  industrious  immigrants. 

Congress  was  so  divided  on  the  question  of 
free  soil  or  slave  labor  in  these  new  possessions 
that  all  legislation  was  impossible.  The  House 
would  pass  no  bill  organizing  them  without  a 
proviso  prohibiting  slavery,  while  the  Senate 


64  WILLIAM  UENRY   SEWARD. 

would  assent  to  no  bill  containing  any  such  pro 
viso  ;  and  Congress  adjourned  six  months  after 
the  peace,  leaving  them  without  a  legal  govern 
ment  or  any  provision  for  forming  one.  Under 
these  circumstances,  the  military  governors  con 
tinued,  though  reluctantly,  to  exercise  the  same 
authority  as  before,  relying  for  their  justification 
quite  as  much  upon  the  necessity  of  the  case 
and  the  tacit  acquiescence  of  the  people,  as  upon 
the  orders  of  the  President.  The  acquiescence 
of  the  people  was  an  unwilling  one  ;  they  were 
much  disappointed  that  no  permanent  govern 
ment  had  been  provided  for  them  ;  but  they  fol 
lowed  the  President's  advice,  and  submitted  to 
the  existing  condition  of  things  in  the  expecta 
tion  that,  as  he  assured  them,  Congress  would 
give  them  a  proper  government  before  the  4th 
of  March,  1849.  As,  however,  from  the  inac 
tion  of  Congress  during  the  winter,  these  hopes 
gradually  faded  away,  while  the  necessity  for  a 
strong  and  permanent  government  became  con 
tinually  more  manifest,  the  people  of  California 
grew  more  and  more  restless,  and  in  various 
localities,  San  Francisco,  Sacramento,  and  else 
where,  the  inhabitants  made  abortive  attempts 
to  establish  local  legislatures  and  governments. 
General  Riley  succeeded  in  inducing  the  lead 
ers  of  these  tentative  governments  to  forbear 
and  delay,  though  he  had  only  persuasion  and 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  65 

argument  to  rely  on,  the  attractions  of  the  mines 
making  it  impossible  to  hold  in  the  ranks  on 
land  either  soldiers,  sailors,  or  marines. 

Riley  was  conscious,  however,  that  he  had  ex 
hausted  his  influence  ;  and  when  he  learned  that 
Congress  had  dissolved,  and  California  was  left 
without  legislature  or  government,  he  at  once 
(June  3,  1849),  issued  a  proclamation,  calling 
upon  the  people  to  choose  delegates  to  a  conven 
tion  to  adopt  a  frame  of  government,  state  or 
territorial,  as  they  might  think  best. 

The  insurmountable  obstacle  to  any  territorial 
legislation  in  the  second  session  of  the  thirtieth 
Congress,  which  expired  March  4,  1849,  had 
been,  as  before,  the  matter  of  slavery ;  the  Sen 
ate  again  rejecting  any  bill  restricting  slavery 
in  the  territories,  and  the  House  insisting  on 
its  absolute  prohibition  there.  The  presidential 
election  of  the  previous  summer  had  been  fought 
by  the  Whigs  with  no  platform  ;  Northern  vot 
ers  had  been  urged  to  support  Taylor  as  the 
candidate  of  the  party  most  firm  and  persist 
ent  in  its  opposition  to  slavery;  while  on  the 
other  hand  it  had"  been  contended  at  the  South 
that  absolute  confidence  could  be  placed  in  him 
as  a  Southern  planter  and  the  owner  of  three 
hundred  slaves.  The  Democratic  party  had 
enunciated  its  doctrines  on  the  subject  of  slavery 
in  the  platform  of  the  convention  :  and  the  plat- 


66  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

form  had  been  supplemented  by  a  letter  from 
General  Cass,  insisting  on  the  right  of  the  people 
of  a  territory  to  settle  the  question  of  slavery  for 
themselves.  This  letter,  however,  was  suscep 
tible  of  a  double  construction,  —  at  the  North  it 
was  declared  to  mean  that  the  people  of  a  ter 
ritory  could  at  any  time  determine  for  themselves 
the  question  of  freedom  or  slavery  there  ;  while 
at  the  South  it  was  relied  on  as  containing  the 
true  Southern  doctrine  that  the  people  of  a  ter 
ritory  were  powerless  to  take  any  action  in  re 
gard  to  slavery  while  in  their  territorial  con 
dition,  and  could  only  do  so  when  framing  a 
state  government. 

Among  the  solutions  of  the  California  ques 
tion  proposed  during  the  winter  of  1848-49,  the 
one  which  had  found  most  favor  in  the  eyes  of 
the  South,  though  it  failed  to  be  adopted,  was 
that  of  authorizing  the  inhabitants  to  form  a 
state  constitution  and  apply  for  admission  to  the 
Union.  The  Southerners  thought  that,  if  a  con 
vention  for  this  purpose  were  to  be  called  under 
an  act  of  Congress,  and  with  sufficient  notice  to 
them,  they  could  flood  California  with  their  own 
people  prepared  to  vote  for  a  pro-slavery  con 
stitution,  before  the  more  distant  Northerners 
could  reach  there.  In  the  meantime,  however, 
they  hesitated  to  carry  their  slaves  thither,  partly 
because  they  feared  that  the  Mexican  laws  abol- 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  67 

ishing  slavery  were  still  in  force,  and  their  slaves 
might  therefore  be  free  in  California ;  partly 
because  they  were  afraid  of  the  passage  of  a 
bill  prohibiting  slavery  there ;  partly  also,  be 
cause,  until  the  discovery  of  gold,  it  was  very 
doubtful  how  far  slave  labor  could  be  made 
profitable  in  California ;  and  for  another  reason, 
perhaps  of  greater  weight  than  all  these,  that 
the  labor  and  expense  of  moving  slaves  ren 
dered  it  practically  impossible  for  any  Southern 
planter  to  compete  in  the  ordinary  processes  of 
emigration  with  the  enterprise  of  the  pioneers 
of  the  North  and  West. 

When  General  Taylor  arrived  in  Washington, 
just  before  his  inauguration,  he  was  greatly  dis 
appointed  to  find  that  Congress  was  likely  to 
expire  without  any  provision  for  the  government 
of  California,  and  he  used  his  best  exertions, 
Seward  acting  as  his  representative  and  adviser, 
to  secure  the  passage  of  a  bill  which  should  give 
the  territories  some  form  of  legal  government. 
Having  failed  in  this  attempt,  he  then,  with  the 
approval  of  all  the  members  of  his  cabinet,  the 
majority  of  whom  were  Southerners,  and  with 
the  assent  of  Seward,  dispatched  to  California 
T.  Butler  King  of  Georgia,  "  to  encourage  the 
people  there  to  form  a  state  constitution  and  ask 
for  admission  to  the  Union,  assuring  them  of 
his  support  should  they  do  so  ;  "  and  he  took  a 


68  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

similar  course  as  to  New  Mexico.  There  is  no 
reason  to  suppose  that  he  had  any  special  pur 
pose,  either  to  introduce  or  prohibit  slavery  in 
either  territory.  His  plan  was  that  which  had 
already  been  proposed,  to  look  to  the  territories 
themselves  for  the  settlement  of  the  territorial 
difficulties,  letting  the  people  organize  their  own 
governments,  since  Congress  would  not  do  so  for 
them.1 

As  it  turned  out,  neither  General  Taylor  nor 
his  messenger  had  any  hand  in  calling  the  Cali 
fornia  convention.  General  Kiley,  the  military 
governor,  had  published  his  proclamation  before 
he  had  any  communication  with  either  of  them. 
The  proclamation  stated -that  the  course  he  was 
taking  was  advised  by  the  President  and  by  the 
secretaries  of  state  and  of  war ;  but  it  is  clear 
from  a  comparison  of  dates  that  the  President 
and  public  officers  to  whom  he  referred  were 
Polk  and  his  secretaries.  King  never  saw  Riley 
till  the  middle  of  June ;  when  the  convention 
met  he  was  dangerously  ill  and  unable  to  be 
present,  and  the  only  advice  he  is  known  to  have 
given  was  to  recommend  that  the  boundaries  of 
the  state  be  made  as  large  as  possible.  This 
was  doubtless  in  accordance  with  Taylor's  view 
of  sweeping  into  two  new  states  all  the  territory 
acquired  from  Mexico  ;  and  this  was  the  course 
1  Letter  of  John  Tyler,  March  5,  1849. 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  69 

advocated  in  the  convention  by  the  Southern 
delegates,  who  may  have  hoped  either  to  prevent 
the  admission  of  California  with  such  extensive 
boundaries,  or  at  a  later  date  to  procure  her 
division  into  two  states,  one  of  which  would  be 
slave  though  the  other  were  free.  At  all  events 
the  boundary  question  was  really  the  only  mat 
ter  in  dispute  in  the  convention.  There  was 
a  due  proportion  of  men  from  the  South  among 
the  delegates,  but  the  clause  prohibiting  slavery 
was  unanimously  adopted. 

When  Congress  assembled  in  December,  1849, 
it  was  known  that  California,  with  a  constitu 
tion  prohibiting  slavery,  would  at  once  apply 
for  admission  as  a  state.  The  Mexican  war  had 
been  a  Southern  war,  brought  about  by  Southern 
policy,  largely  fought  by  Southern  officers  and 
men,  with  the  determination  that  its  final  result 
should  be  "  to  adjust  the  whole  balance  of  power 
in  the  Confederacy  so  as  to  give  the  South  the 
control  over  the  operations  of  the  government  in 
all  time  to  come,"  and  with  the  expectation  that 
the  territory  acquired  by  the  war  would  create  a 
new  demand  for  slave  labor  and  a  great  advance 
in  the  price  of  slaves.  The  admission  of  Cali 
fornia  as  a  free  state  would  not  merely  rob  the 
Southerners  of  what  they  considered  the  just 
political  and  pecuniary  fruits  of  this  war,  but 
also,  unless  accompanied  by  that  of  a  slave  state 


70  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

at  the  same  time,  would  destroy  that  equilibrium 
of  sectional  power  in  the  Senate  which  had  been 
successfully  maintained  ever  since  slavery  had 
become  a  political  question. 

Party  ties  were  to  a  certain  extent  dropped 
when  Congress  assembled.  The  Southern 
Whigs  and  Democrats  stood  together  on  every 
question  which  appeared  to  them  to  have  any 
sectional  bearing.  They  were  supported  by 
some  Northern  Democrats,  and  were  also  aided 
by  the  small  knot  of  Free  Soilers  in  the  House, 
whose  violence  of  language,  half  justified  by  the 
personal  attacks  on  themselves,  hindered  the 
cause  they  professed  to  have  at  heart,  and  helped 
that  party  which  they  said  they  were  seeking 
to  destroy.  For  a  whole  month  the  House  of 
Representatives  attempted  to  elect  a  speaker,1 
and  during  this  time  the  talk  of  the  Secessionists 
was  defiant  and  treasonable. 

When  at  last  the  House  was  organized  and 
the  President's  message  read,  the  vital  strug 
gle  began.  There  were  several  burning  ques 
tions  connected  with  the  war :  the  admission  of 
California,  the  question  of  the  true  limits  of 

1  The  Free  Soilers  were  not  averse  to  any  speaker  who  would 
pledge  himself  to  give  the  Wilmot  Proviso  members  control  of 
the  Committee  on  Territories,  and  nearly  succeeded  in  electing1 
a  Democrat  who  had  promised  in  writing  to  do  this.  Seward 
urged  the  Whigs  of  the  House  to  stand  firmly  by  Mr.  Win- 
throp,  the  regular  Whig  candidate. 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  71 

Texas,  —  those  which  the  United  States  were 
bound  to  recognize,  —  the  proper  governments 
for  New  Mexico  and  Utah.  The  President 
thought  California  should  be  admitted,  because 
she  had  the  population  and  all  the  other  condi 
tions  requisite  to  form  a  state.  He  hoped  that 
New  Mexico  might  also  come  in  as  a  state  with 
a  proper  frame  of  government,  and  that  the 
Texas  boundary  question  might  be  settled  as  a 
judicial  matter  before  the  Supreme  Court.  He 
doubtless  had  some  feeling  and  a  very  decided 
opinion  upon  this  latter  question,  as  he  knew 
from  his  own  personal  experience  during  the 
war,  that,  whatever  might  have  been  claimed 
on  paper,  Texas  had  never  actually  governed  a 
single  inch  of  the  land  in  dispute.1  The  only 
importance  of  the  matter  arose  from  the  fact 
that  if  the  lands  in  dispute  were  a  part  of  Texas 
they  were  already  slave  territory ;  if  they  be 
longed  to  Mexico  and  became  ours  by  the  treaty, 
slavery  had  been  abolished  there  before  we 

1  Texas  had  advanced  claims  to  a  large  portion  of  New 
Mexico,  cutting  off  many  thousand  square  miles  where  there 
was  no  slavery,  and  insisting  that  it  was  included  within  her 
own  limits  where  there  was  slavery.  Polk,  at  the  very  end  of 
his  administration,  issued  orders  to  the  officer  in  command  at 
New  Mexico  to  fall  back  before  any  inroad  of  the  Texans,  and 
surrender  possession  of  the  disputed  territory.  These  orders 
Taylor  at  once  revoked,  and  directed  him  to  maintain  the 
boundary  line  as  the  United  States  found  it,  and  as  ceded  to 
them  by  the  treaty. 


72  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

acquired  them.  It  was  not,  therefore,  merely 
a  Texas  question,  but  a  slavery  question,  and  so 
a  sectional  one. 

There  were  other  matters,  the  discussion  of 
which  served  to  excite  still  more  the  hostile  feel 
ing  already  existing  between  North  and  South. 
These  were,  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  Dis 
trict  of  Columbia,  the  prohibition  of  the  slave 
trade  between  the  states  (neither  of  which  had 
any  such  support  as  to  make  it  of  political  im 
portance),  the  inefficiency  of  the  law  for  the 
surrender  of  fugitive  slaves,  and  the  reluctance 
of  the  North  to  comply  with  the  constitutional 
requirements  on  this  point ;  and  the  prevention 
of  the  use  of  the  District  of  Columbia  as  the 
common  slave  mart  and  exchange  for  the  entire 
South.  Though  this  last  was  hardly  a  sectional 
issue,  and  received  the  support  of  senators  and 
representatives  from  all  parts  of  the  country,  yet 
it  lay  dangerously  near  the  burning  brand  of 
slavery  agitation,  and  debate  upon  it  was  liable 
to  become  passionate  and  personal. 

Upon  the  question  of  slavery  in  the  territo 
ries,  the  Southern  view  was :  That  the  Constitu 
tion  is  a  compact  of  union  for  limited  purposes 
between  several  sovereign  states,  the  citizens  of 
each  of  which  have  in  all  the  territories  a  com 
mon  property  and  equal  rights  with  the  citizens 
of  every  other  state,  any  citizen  having  the  right 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  73 

to  carry  there  all  property  of  every  species 
recognized  as  such  by  the  laws  of  his  own  state, 
and  therefore  slaves,  if  slaves  were  property  in 
the  state  from  which  they  were  taken.  Some 
Southerners  went  even  farther  than  this,  and 
insisted  that  tinder  the  provisions  of  the  Consti 
tution  for  the  return  of  fugitive  slaves  to  their 
masters,  and  for  slave  representation  in  Con 
gress,  slaves  were  a  kind  of  property  entitled 
to  special  and  peculiar  favor,  singled  out  by 
the  Constitution  from  the  mass  of  other  prop 
erty,  invested  with  higher  dignity  and  guarded 
with  greater  security,  too  precious  to  be  en 
trusted  solely  to  state  law,  and  especially  under 
the  protecting  aegis  of  the  Constitution;  or,  as 
it  was  forcibly  put  by  one  of  the  ablest  expo 
nents  of  the  Southern  doctrine :  "  This  is  a  pro- 
slavery  government;  slavery  is  stamped  upon 
its  heart,  the  Constitution.  No  matter  where 
you  place  the  power  to  legislate  on  the  territory, 
the  power  to  legislate  on  questions  of  slavery 
is  a  legitimate  instrument  of  it.  Slaves  are 
property  —  our  property.  If  it  is  said  slavery 
is  a  peculiar  institution  against  the  common 
law  of  mankind,  then  I  reply,  our  government 
is  a  peculiar  government,  our  Constitution  is 
a  peculiar  Constitution,  for  they  are  both  im 
pregnated  with  this  peculiarity."  In  short,  it 
was  insisted  that,  without  any  legal  enactments, 


74  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

slavery  existed  by  force  of  the  Constitution  in 
all  the  territories  of  the  United  States,  and  that 
neither  foreign  laws  before  conquest,  nor  domes 
tic  legislation  afterwards,  could  prohibit  or  abol 
ish  it  there. 

The  original  opposition  of  the  North  to  the 
extension  of  slavery  to  the  new  territories  was 
not  founded  upon  political  considerations.  The 
Northerners  had  submitted,  without  reluctance, 
to  the  supremacy  of  the  South  for  two  thirds,  or 
more,  of  the  whole  period  of  the  history  of  the 
government,  and  were  practically  indifferent 
about  the  matter.  The  men  of  the  North  were 
engaged  in  all  sorts  of  industrial  and  commercial 
enterprises,  their  interest  in  politics  was  limited, 
and  their  opposition  to  slavery  and  its  exten 
sion  was  in  most  cases  an  objection  upon  moral 
grounds.  The  Southerners,  on  the  contrary, 
had  practically  no  occupations  except  politics 
and  the  ordinary  pursuits  of  a  country  life, 
and  they  had  controlled  the  government  almost 
from  its  foundation,  either  directly  through  one 
of  their  own  number,  or  indirectly  through  some 
Northerner  designated  by  them  for  President. 
They  saw  the  possibility,  and  feared  the  prob 
ability,  of  this  political  supremacy  slipping  from 
them,  and  believed  the  admission  of  California 
as  a  free  state  to  be  the  first  fatal  step  in  a  path 
which  would  ultimately  leave  them  in  a  position 


THE    COMPROMISE  RESOLUTIONS.  75 

of  inferiority  and  subjection  to  the  North  in  the 
government  and  administration.  To  them  the 
contest  was  not  merely  for  a  theoretic  principle, 
but  for  a  positive,  actual,  valuable  right. 

General  Taylor  having  been  nominated  with 
no  platform  or  declaration  of  principles,  any 
policy  which  he  advocated  as  to  the  settlement 
of  the  slavery  question  might  fairly  be  called 
the  President's  policy,  and  no  Whig  need  feel 
that,  if  he  failed  to  support  it,  he  was  break 
ing  loose  from  his  party.  There  was,  indeed, 
no  Whig  party,  in  that  sense  in  which  party 
means  a  combination  of  persons  agreeing  upon 
certain  political  principles,  and  united  to  carry 
out  a  certain  political  policy.  The  questions 
which  had  united  the  Whigs  were  either  dead 
or  dormant,  and  on  the  only  living  political 
issue  they  had,  as  a  national  party,  no  princi 
ples  and  no  policy.  Those  members  of  Con 
gress,  therefore,  who  had  been  always  classed 
as  Whigs  and  were  elected  as  Whigs,  felt  at 
liberty  to  vote  as  they  pleased  upon  all  the 
questions  relating  to  the  territory. 

Taylor  was  unfortunate  also  in  the  fact  that 
he  had  not  the  support  of  the  two  great  leaders 
of  the  Whig  party,  Clay  and  Webster.  Clay 
thought  himself  ill-treated  by  Taylor  in  regard 
to  the  nomination,  and  never  forgave  it.  He 
had  declined  to  advocate  or  support  him  during 


76  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

the  campaign.  He  was  not  present  at  the  inau 
guration,  and  when  he  took  his  seat  in  the  Senate 
in  the  middle  of  December,  he  announced  his 
purpose  of  taking  "  the  lead  of  no  subject  and 
no  party ;  "  while  a  few  weeks  later  he  made  a 
speech  which  drew  from  one  of  his  opponents 
the  observation,  that  he  well  knew  "  the  sena 
tor  from  Kentucky  formally  declined  exercising 
on  behalf  of  the  administration  a  parliamentary 
leadership,  but  had  no  suspicion,  until  he  lis 
tened  to  his  speech,  that  he  meditated  a  regular 
course  of  hostilities  against  those  in  power." 
Clay's  opposition  to  the  administration  became 
more  decided  as  the  session  went  on. 

Webster,  the  other  great  leader  of  the  Whig 
party,  had  sulked  in  his  tent  by  the  sea  the 
whole  summer  long;  and  when  he  was  at  last 
induced  to  leave  his  solitude  to  speak  at  a  politi 
cal  meeting,  he  would  only  say  that,  though  Tay 
lor's  nomination  was  one  not  fit  to  be  made, 
yet,  as  he  was  the  Whig  candidate,  he  should 
support  him.  He  was  in  Washington  when 
Taylor  arrived  there,  and  called  upon  him  at 
once ;  but  his  real  feeling  towards  the  incom 
ing  President  is  to  be  seen  in  an  extract  from 
a  letter,  in  which  he  says:  "Although  I  would 
not  yield  myself  to  any  undue  feelings  of  self- 
respect,  yet  it  is  certain  that  I  am  senior  in 
years  to  General  Taylor,  that  I  have  been 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  77 

thirty  years  in  public  life,  .  .  .  have  had  ... 
friends,  who  have  thought  that  for  the  admin 
istration  of  civil  and  political  affairs  my  own 
qualifications  entitle  me  to  be  considered  a  can 
didate  to  the  office  for  which  General  Taylor 
has  been  chosen.  I  feel  [therefore]  that  I  shall 
best  consult  my  own  dignity  by  declining  to  fill 
a  subordinate  position  in  the  executive  govern 
ment."  l 

Even  before  Congress  met,  Taylor's  course  as 
to  California  had  alienated  the  leading  Southern 
Whigs,  upon  whom  he  might  have  thought  he 
could  depend  ;  and  either  from  inclination  or 
necessity  he  consulted  Seward,  the  only  Whig 
senator  from  the  most  important  state  in  the 
Union,  and  his  active  supporter  in  the  election 
campaign.  Before  the  inauguration  Taylor's  re 
lations  with  him  had  been  friendly  and  confi 
dential,  and  very  soon  afterwards  the  existence 
of  such  relations  was  called  to  the  attention  of 
the  public  by  a  published  letter  from  Seward, 
written  to  exonerate  Taylor  from  the  charge  of 
using  his  personal  influence  for  legislation  which 
would  practically  extend  slavery  to  the  territo 
ries.  The  letter  was  well  intentioned  but  un- 

1  Webster's  Life,  ii.  p.  357.  Webster  was  born  January, 
1782,  Taylor  in  September,  1784.  A  year  later  Webster 
accepted  a  subordinate  position,  and  became  Secretary  of 
State  to  Fillmore,  who  was  born  in  January,  1800,  and  so  was 
sixteen  years  younger  than  Taylor. 


78  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

fortunate.  There  was  no  real  occasion  for  its 
publication.  It  injured  the  President,  not  only 
with  Clay  and  the  Southern  Whigs,  but  also 
with  Webster  and  his  friends,  to  have  public 
proclamation  made  that  he  was  taking  for  one 
of  his  chief  counselors  a  radical  anti- slavery 
man  like  Sevvard,  and  one  so  inexperienced  in 
national  politics.  The  necessity  for  printing  the 
letter  was  so  little  apparent,  that  Seward  was 
taunted  with  having  done  this  that  he  might 
make  a  display  of  his  confidential  relations  with 
the  administration  ;  while  its  publication  made 
him  a  ready  mark  for  the  attacks  of  all  the 
senators,  of  whatever  party,  who  were  either 
publicly  or  privately  hostile  to  the  administra 
tion. 

From  the  moment  of  the  assembling  of  Con 
gress  the  air  of  the  Capitol  was  heavy  with  the 
coming  storm,  and  gusts  of  political  passion 
swept  over  it  almost  every  day.  There  seemed 
to  be  no  question,  the  discussion  of  which  was 
harmless.  A  resolution  to  extend  the  courtesies 
of  the  Senate  to  Father  Mathew,  the  Irish 
apostle  of  temperance,  brought  on  a  discussion 
as  to  slavery.  A  debate  upon  our  diplomatic 
relations  with  Austria  soon  drifted  into  the  same 
channel. 

In  talking  about  the  subjects  to  be  embraced 
in  the  census,  abolition  and  the  abolitionists  were 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  79 

« 
among  the  topics  treated  of,  and  the  discussion 

was  made  the  occasion  for  bitter  personalities. 
Threats  of  disunion  were  frequent.  These  were 
partly  in  earnest,  and  were  partly  intended  to 
excite  the  fears  of  the  people  of  the  North,  that 
they  might  yield  more  readily  to  the  demands 
of  the  slaveholders  and  assent  to  the  legislation 
they  desired.  In  many  of  these  debates  Seward 
took  part,  and  was,  when  the  occasion  required, 
vigorous  and  outspoken  in  declaring  his  hostil 
ity  to  slavery  and  his  hopes  of  ultimate  emanci 
pation.  He  made  no  personal  attacks  on  any 
one,  and  replied  once  for  all  to  those  made  on 
him :  "I  am  here  for  public  measures,  not  for 
private  ends,  and  no  imputations  shall  ever  put 
me  on  a  defense  of  myself  against  aspersions  or 
complaints  of  this  kind." 

Taylor,  though  inexperienced  in  political  af 
fairs  or  civil  administration,  was  a  man  of  good 
sense,  single-minded,  honest,  direct,  averse  to 
anything  in  the  nature  of  political  intrigue  or 
bargain,  of  sterling  integrity,  of  undoubted 
loyalty  and  unhesitating  courage,  perfectly  able 
and  determined  to  discharge  his  duty  as  he 
understood  it,  and  impatient  at  the  Southern 
bluster  and  threats  of  disunion,  which  he  con 
sidered  treasonable,  and  in  the  face  of  which 
what  was  called  compromise  seemed  to  him  a 
cowardly  surrender  to  disloyalty.  There  was  to 


80  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

his  mind  no  connection  between  a  bill  admitting 
California  as  a  free  state  and  acts  organizing 
the  other  territories,  or  establishing  the  true 
boundaries  of  Texas  ;  and  a  combination  to  se 
cure  the  passage  of  any  one  bill  by  arrangement 
with  the  friends  of  the  others  seemed  to  him  a 
base  business.  He  might  have  assented  to  all 
the  measures  contemplated  by  Clay's  compromise 
resolutions,  each  on  its  own  merits,  but  never 
as  a  bargain  between  contending  sections.1  On 
the  21st  of  January,  1850,  he  sent  to  Congress 
a  message  recommending  the  admission  of  Cali 
fornia  with  the  constitution  it  had  formed  pro 
hibiting  slavery,  confining  his  message  to  this 
subject  alone. 

Clay,  Calhoun,  and  Webster  were  this  year 
together  in  the  Senate  for  the  last  time.  Clay 
was  the  man  of  compromise.  He  had  been 
the  father  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  in  1821, 
had  quieted  the  threatened  nullification  outbreak 
of  South  Carolina  a  dozen  years  later  by  an- 
another  compromise,  and  now  came  forward  for 
the  last  time,  offering  a  series  of  resolutions  to 

1  "  I  would  rather  have  California  wait  than  bring  in  all 
the  '  territories  on  her  back.'  "  Taylor  to  Webster,  Curtis's 
Webster,  ii.  473.  Southern  Whigs  in  Congress  said  the  Southern 
officers  would  refuse  to  obey,  if  ordered  to  maintain  the  line 
of  New  Mexico  against  Texas.  "Th'en."  said  Taylor,  "I 
will  command  the  army  in  person,  and  hang  any  man  taken  in 
treason."  Schouler,  v.  p.  185. 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  81 

be  afterwards  embodied  in  appropriate  legisla 
tion.  They  were  intended  to  cover  all  the  mat 
ters  in  dispute,  and  to  be  a  full  and  final 
adjustment  of  all  questions  relating  to  slavery. 
California  was  to  be  admitted  as  a  free  state  ; 
the  other  territory  conquered  from  Mexico  was 
to  have  a  proper  territorial  government,  with 
no  provision  either  introducing  or  excluding 
slavery  ;  the  western  boundary  of  Texas  was  to 
be  established,  and  that  state  to  be  paid  from 
the  public  treasury  for  the  relinquishment  of 
its  claims  to  any  part  of  New  Mexico.  The 
resolves  further  declared  that,  so  long  as  slavery 
existed  in  Maryland  and  Delaware,  it  was  inex 
pedient  to  abolish  it  in  the  District  of  Columbia 
without  the  assent  of  those  states  ;  but  that  it 
was  expedient  to  prohibit  there  the  trade  in 
slaves  brought  from  without  the  District ;  that 
Congress  had  no  power  to  interfere  with  the 
slave  trade  between  the  different  slave  states, 
and  that  more  effectual  provision  ought  to  be 
made  for  the  restitution  of  fugitive  slaves. 

Clay  had  been  for  some  time  deliberating  on 
the  matter  of  these  resolutions.  On  the  2d 
of  January  he  wrote  his  son  James  :  "  I  have 
been  thinking  much  of  proposing  some  compre 
hensive  scheme  of  settling  amicably  the  whole 
question  in  all  its  bearings,  but  have  not  yet 
positively  determined  to  do  so."  Before  offer- 


82  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

ing  his  resolves,  he  went,  on  a  stormy  evening, 
to  Webster's  house  and  secured  his  approval. 
He  introduced  them  in  the  Senate  at  the  end  of 
the  month,  and  a  little  later  the  great  debate 
began.  For  two  days,  to  a  chamber  crowded 
with  an  eager  and  excited  audience,  Clay  spoke 
eloquently  and  persuasively  in  support  of  his 
resolves,  appealing  to  the  North  for  concession, 
and  to  the  South  for  peace.  A  month  later 
Calhoun,  tall,  gaunt,  and  haggard,  with  the 
shadow  of  coining  death  on  his  face,  sat  in  the 
Senate,  while  a  friend  read  for  him  his  carefully 
prepared  argument.  He  opposed  Clay's  reso 
lutions,  and  insisted  that  the  South  required 
further  legislation  for  the  protection  of  her 
peculiar  institution  and  for  the  security  and 
maintenance  of  that  equilibrium  between  the 
slave  and  free  states,  which  he  asserted  was  a 
fundamental  condition  originally  insisted  on  by 
the  South  in  joining  the  Union.  On  the  7th 
of  March  Webster  followed.  His  speech  was 
not  a  discussion  of  the  subjects  considered  in 
Clay's  resolutions  ;  it  was  an  appeal  "  for  the 
preservation  of  the  Union  "  and  the  restoration 
to  the  country  of  quiet  and  harmony.  Pene 
trated  with  a  deep  sense  of  what  the  Union  had 
accomplished  during  the  seventy  years  of  its 
existence,  and  of  the  future  it  promised,  if  it 
remained  unbroken,  he  compared  slavery  to  a 


THE    COMPROMISE   RESOLUTIONS.  83 

spot  on  the  face  of  the  sun,  and  the  persons  who 
would  break  up  the  government  on  account  of 
it  to  those  who  would  strike  the  light  from  the 
heavens,  if  there  were  any  imperfection  in  it, 
and  prefer  the  chance  of  utter  darkness.  He 
endeavored  to  make  the  proposed  compromises 
acceptable  to  the  free  states,  he  minimized  the 
concessions  required  of  them  and  either  wholly 
omitted  or  touched  but  lightly  on  their  com 
plaints  ;  while  he  dwelt  at  length  on  the  wrongs 
done  the  South  by  the  general  hostility  to  slav 
ery,  by  the  violent  language  of  the  abolitionists, 
and  by  the  evasion  of  the  constitutional  provi 
sion  for  the  surrender  of  fugitive  slaves.  He 

O 

would,  therefore,  he  said,  vote  for  a  more  strin 
gent  law  on  the  last  subject ;  while  he  should 
vote  against  the  insertion  of  a  proviso  prohibit 
ing  slavery  in  any  bills  organizing  governments 
for  the  territory  acquired  from  Mexico,  because 
slavery  was  excluded  from  those  regions  by  a 
law  of  nature,  and  he  would  not  "  reenact  the 
will  of  God,"  or  wound  to  no  purpose  the  pride 
of  the  South.  Upon  the  other  subjects  of  the 
resolves  he  was  silent. 

This  speech  was  a  great  disappointment  to 
many  Northern  Whigs,  including  some  of  Web 
ster's  warmest  supporters.  It  cannot  be  denied 
that  it  has  a  very  different  ring  from  that  in 
which  he  claimed  the  Wilmot  proviso  as  his  own 


84  WILLIAM  HF.NRY  SEWARD. 

thunder,  or  from  his  political  utterances  of  the 
September  previous,  when  he  said  :  "  There  has 
for  a  long  time  been  no  North ;  I  think  the 
North  star  is  at  last  discovered.  I  think  there 
will  be  a  North,  but  up  to  the  recent  session  of 
Congress  there  has  been  no  North,  no  section  of 
the  country  in  which  there  has  been  found  a 
strong,  conscientious,  united  opposition  to  slav 
ery  ;  no  such  North  has  existed."  Yet,  though 
there  was  much  bitterness  of  feeling  and  criti 
cism,  and  imputation  of  base  motives  at  the  time, 
it  is  only  just  to  Mr.  Webster  to  admit  that  the 
speech  may  have  been  inspired  by  his  profound 
love  for  the  Union  and  his  conviction  that  it 
was  in  great  peril ;  that  his  honest  apprehen 
sions  of  its  imminent  destruction  affected  the 
whole  tone  as  well  as  the  conclusions  of  the 
argument  by  which  he  attempted  to  undo  at 
once  with  the  Northern  voters  his  own  work  of 
many  years.  The  success  he  met  with  at  the 
time  is  a  striking  tribute  to  his  personal  power. 
In  the  cities  the  merchants,  manufacturers  and 
business  people  generally,  many  scholars  and 
thoughtful  persons  acting  with  them,  held  large 
and  enthusiastic  Union  meetings,  and  resolved 
their  approval  of  Webster's  speech  and  Clay's 
compromises.  But  the  country  folks  —  the  rural 
districts,  held  off,  and  Webster  never  regained 
his  hold  on  them.  The  Whig  party  at  the 


THE    COMPROMISE  RESOLUTIONS.  85 

North  split  into  two  factions,  —  the  "  Con 
science  "  and  the  "  Cotton "  Whigs.  There 
were  in  the  next  Congress  an  increased  num 
ber  of  senators  and  representatives  distinctly 
opposed  to  the  doctrine  of  the  7th  of  March 
speech  and  to  the  measures  of  compromise. 
These  members  made  the  nucleus  for  the  forma 
tion  of  the  Republican  party. 


CHAPTER  V. 

CALIFOKNIA  AND  THE  COMPROMISES  :    SEWARD*S 
SPEECH. 

SEWARD,  during  the  winter,  was  the  object 
of  many  attacks  and  a  great  deal  of  personal 
abuse  from  Southern  senators,  who  seemed  to 
go  out  of  their  way  to  insult  him.  To  these 
he  replied,  as  has  been  said,  that  he  had  come 
to  the  Senate  for  public,  not  for  private  ends ; 
that  he  should  pass  by  in  silence,  as  he  had 
before  done,  all  such  personal  attacks ;  that  he 
admitted  the  purity  and  patriotism  of  the  mo 
tives  of  all  other  senators,  and  expected  the  same 
justice  to  be  done  to  himself.  He  was  not  on 
any  committee  during  this  session.  He  asked 
to  be  excused  from  the  committee  on  patents,  to 
which  he  had  been  assigned,  upon  the  ground 
that  his  previous  employment  as  counsel  in  patent 
suits  might  be  embarrassing  to  him ;  and  no 
other  place  could  be  found  for  him  except  by  a 
re-arrangement  of  all  the  committees,  which  he 
thought  not  worth  while. 

When  Clay  and  Webster  spoke,  the  silver 
tongue  and  personal  charm  of  the  one,  the 


CALIFORNIA  AND    THE    COMPROMISES.      87 

majestic  eloquence  and  noble  presence  of  the 
other,  and  the  national  reputation  of  both,  filled 
the  Senate  chamber  with  their  admirers,  women 
as  well  as  men ;  and  their  speeches  found  a  sym 
pathetic  response  in  the  breasts  of  the  people 
of  Washington,  Southerners  and  slaveholders  as 
they  were.  Seward  had  no  such  presence,  no 
such  eloquence,  no  such  reputation,  and  when  a 
few  days  later  he  rose  to  speak,  the  Senate  was 
substantially  empty.  The  President's  message 
transmitting  the  constitution  of  California  was 
the  special  order  of  the  day,  and  it  was  to  the 
question  of  the  admission  of  that  state  that  he 
particularly  addressed  himself.  It  is  difficult  to 
give  within  moderate  limits  an  analysis  of  this 
great  speech.  An  intelligent  listener  said  of  it, 
at  the  time,  that  it  "  was  marked  by  more  breadth 
of  view,  more  vigor  of  thought,  and  a  more  pro 
found  and  masterly  treatment  of  the  subject, 
than  was  displayed  by  either  Clay  or  Webster." 
On  the  other  hand,  Clay  wrote  to  his  son  a  few 
days  after  its  delivery,  "  Mr.  Seward's  late  abo 
lition  speech  .  .  .  has, eradicated  the  respect  of 
almost  all  men  for  him."  These  different  state 
ments  represent  the  extreme  divergence  of  public 
opinion  at  the  North  and  South.  The  speech 
marked  an  epoch  in  discussions  on  slavery-Hi  the 
Senate  of  the  United  States.  It  was  the  first 
time  that  any  senator,  regularly  elected  by  one 


88  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

of  the  great  parties  of  the  country,  had  made  in 
the  Senate  not  merely  a  statement  of  his  own 
position,  but  what  was  felt  to  be  an  authentic 
declaration  of  the  attitude  as  to  slavery  of  a 
formidable  and  growing  minority,  if  not  a  ma 
jority,  of  the  people  of  the  North.  It  was  the 
first  time  that  the  senators  had  been  called  on 
to  recognize  the  fact,  which  many  of  them  were 
striving  to  ignore,  that  "  a  moral  question,  tran 
scending  the  too  narrow  creeds  of  parties,  had 
arisen,  that  the  public  conscience  was  expanding 
with  it,  and  the  green  withes  of  party  associa 
tions  giving  way  and  falling  off." 

Seward  began  by  brushing  aside  the  formal 
and  trifling  objections  brought  forward  by  the 
opponents  of  the  immediate  admission  of  Cali 
fornia,  all  of  which  were  to  be  waived  if  the 
admission  of  this  free  state  should  be  accompa 
nied  by  sundry  irrelevant  concessions  to  slavery, 
—  a  new  fugitive  slave  law,  a  guaranty  of  the 
perpetuity  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia, 
acquiescence  in  its  existence  in  the  territories 
of  Utah  and  New  Mexico.  Passing  from  these 
objections,  he  proceeded  to  state  the  reasons, 
which  to  his  mind  rendered  the  immediate  ad 
mission  of  California  imperative.  The  substance 
of  these  was,  that  California  was  in  fact  already 
a  state,  and  could  never  be  a  territory,  colony, 
or  military  dependence ;  that  remote  as  she  was 


CALIFORNIA   AND    THE    COMPROMISES.       89 

on  the  Pacific  coast,  with  the  population  that 
had  suddenly  filled  her  borders,  she  needed  a 
constitution,  sovereignty,  independence  and  pro 
tection,  —  either  a  share  of  ours,  which  she  had 
asked  for,  or  her  own,  which  she  could  assume 
without  our  consent,  if  we  rejected  her  appeal ; 
and  that  if  we  wished  to  retain  her,  and  Oregon 
with  her,  we  could  not  afford  to  trifle  or  delay. 
He  then  considered  the  position  of  those  persons 
who  insisted  that  to  the  admission  of  California 
should  be  joined  fresh  compromises  on  questions 
connected  with  slavery.  It  was  to  what  he  had 
to  say  on  this  point  that  the  especial  interest  and 
importance  of  his  speech  attached.  The  admis 
sion  of  California  was  almost  conceded.  The  real 
struggle  was  on  what  should  be  yielded  in  re 
turn.  Declaring  himself,  for  various  reasons, 
opposed  to  all  legislative  compromises  not  ab 
solutely  necessary,  he  took  up  in  turn  each  of 
the  particular  measures  proposed,  commenting 
briefly  on  the  incongruity  of  the  subjects  tacked 
together  in  the  resolves.  He  next  examined  Cal- 
houn's  statement,  that  nothing  would  satisfy  the 
South  except  such  legislation  as  would  secure  a 
permanent  equilibrium  between  the  free  and  slave 
states  ;  this  he  pronounced  absolutely  impossible, 
as  it  must  involve  a  veto  by  the  minority  of  the 
majority,  which  meant  nothing  less  than  a  return 
to  the  rope  of  sand  of  the  old  Confederacy ;  and 


90  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

a  subjection  of  the  people  of  the  growing  states 
of  the  North  and  West  to  the  more  stationary 
population  of  the  slave  states. 

Speaking  of  the  proposed  fugitive  slave  law, 
he  took  the  ground  not  merely  that  a  more 
stringent  law  would  be  useless,  as  it  was  opposed 
to  the  moral  convictions  of  the  people  of  the 
North,  denied  all  the  recognized  safeguards  of 
personal  liberty,  and  converted  into  a  crime  that 
hospitality  to  the  outcast  and  refugee  which  all 
mankind  save  the  slaveholder  considered  an  act 
of  common  humanity  ;  but  he  also  insisted,  that 
to  have  the  constitutional  provision  as  to  the 
return  of  fugitive  slaves  honestly  carried  out, 
the  rigors  of  the  law  must  be  alleviated,  not  in 
creased.  Referring  to  the  proposal  that,  as  part 
of  the  compromises,  Congress  should  deprive  it 
self  of  the  power  of  emancipation  in  the  Dis 
trict  of  Columbia,  he  declared  that  he  would  at 
any  time  vote  for  the  abolition  of  slavery  there, 
with  a  proper  compensation  to  the  slave-owners, 
and  was  willing  to  appropriate  any  sum  neces 
sary  for  this  purpose. 

It  was,  however,  what  he  said  in  treating  of 
the  public  domain,  and  of  the  power  and  duty 
of  Congress  in  regard  to  it,  that  so  greatly 
stirred  the  people  of  both  sections  at  the  time, 
and  has  since  been  often  quoted  and  misinter 
preted  by  both  friends  and  enemies. 


CALIFORNIA   AND    THE    COMPROMISES.       91 

"The  national  domain  is  ours.  ...  It  was 
acquired  by  the  valor  and  with  the  wealth  of 
the  whole  nation.  We  hold,  nevertheless,  no 
arbitrary  power  over  it.  ...  The  Constitution 
regulates  our  stewardship ;  the  Constitution 
devotes  the  domain  to  union,  to  justice,  to  de 
fense,  to  welfare,  and  to  liberty.  But  there  is  a 
higher  law  than  the  Constitution,  which  regu 
lates  our  authority  over  the  domain,  and  devotes 
it  to  the  same  noble  purposes.  The  territory 
is  a  part  of  the  common  heritage  of  mankind, 
bestowed  upon  them  by  the  Creator.  We  are 
His  stewards,  and  must  so  discharge  our  trust 
as  to  secure  in  the  highest  attainable  degree 
their  happiness.  .  .  .  Whether,  therefore,  I  re 
gard  the  welfare  of  the  future  inhabitants  of 
these  new  territories,  or  the  security  and  welfare 
of  the  whole  people  of  the  United  States,  I 
cannot  consent  to  introduce  slavery  into  any 
part  of  this  continent,  which  is  now  exempt  from 
what  seems  to  me  so  great  an  evil,  ...  or  to 
compromise  the  questions  relating  to  slavery,  as 
a  condition  of  the  admission  of  California." 

To  the  argument  that  the  prohibition  of 
slavery  was  unnecessary,  he  answered  :  — 

"  There  is  no  climate  uncongenial  to  slavery. 
.  .  .  Labor  is  in  quick  demand  in  all  new  coun 
tries.  Slave  labor  is  cheaper  than  free  labor, 
and  it  would  go  first  into  new  regions,  and 


92  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

wherever  it  goes  it  brings  labor  into  dishonor. 
.  .  .  Was  the  ordinance  of  1787  necessary  or 
not  ?  Necessary,  we  all  agree ;  and  yet  that 
ordinance  extended  the  inhibition  of  slavery 
from  the  thirty-seventh  to  the  fortieth  parallel 
of  latitude.  .  .  .  We  are  told  that  we  may  rely 
on  the  laws  of  God,  which  prohibit  slave  labor 
in  this  new  territory,  and  that  it  is  absurd  to 
re-enact  the  laws  of  God.  The  Constitution  of 
the  United  States  and  the  constitutions  of  all 
the  states  are  full  of  such  re-enactments.  Wher 
ever  I  find  a  law  of  God  or  a  law  of  nature 
disregarded,  or  in  danger  of  being  disregarded, 
there  I  shall  vote  to  re-affirm  it  with  all  the 
sanction  of  civil  authority." 

In  all  this  there  is  nothing  startling,  revo 
lutionary  or  treasonable,  nothing  even  that  is 
novel  or  original.  The  same  thought  had  been 
expressed  more  than  once  by  English  philoso 
phers  and  writers  upon  jurisprudence.  Two 
hundred  and  fifty  years  before,  Bishop  Hooker 
had  written  those  noble  and  familiar  words : 
"  Of  law,  there  can  be  no  less  acknowledged 
than  that  her  seat  is  in  the  bosom  of  God." 
Already  in  this  very  speech  Seward  had  quoted 
from  another  political  philosopher,  "  There  is 
but  one  law  for  all,  namely,  that  law  which 
governs  all  law,  —  the  law  of  our  Creator."  In 
any  point  of  view  the  passage  was  harmless,  for 


CALIFORNIA   AND    THE    COMPROMISES.       93 

far  from  antagonizing  or  contrasting  the  Consti 
tution  and  the  laws  of  God,  Seward  was  insist 
ing  that  they  were  both  in  harmony  and  working 
to  the  same  noble  ends. 

Nor  was  he  responsible  for  introducing  into  the 
debate  both  the  "  higher  law  "  and  the  Consti 
tution  as  conclusive  authorities  as  to  slavery  and 
the  rights  of  the  slaveholders.  Southern  sena 
tors  had  already  appealed  to  them.  On  the  day 
on  which  Clay  introduced  his  resolutions,  Mason, 
of  Virginia,  and  Davis,  of  Mississippi,  had  both 
insisted  that  the  Constitution  carried  slavery 
into  all  the  territories,  and  protected  it  there. 
A  fortnight  later,  Davis  declared  slavery  to  be 
"a  blessing,  established  by  God's  decree,  and 
sanctioned  by  the  Bible,  from  Genesis  to  Keve- 
lations."  A  few  days  before  Seward  spoke, 
Davis  had  again  rested  the  Southern  case  upon 
the  same  authorities,  saying :  "  It  is  the  Bible 
and  the  Constitution  on  which  we  rely,  and  we 
are  not  to  be  answered  by  the  dicta  of  earthly 
wisdom  or  more  earthly  arrogance,  when  we 
have  those  high  authorities  to  teach  and  to  con 
strue  the  decrees  of  God."  It  was  natural,  there 
fore,  it  was  fit,  and  it  was  necessary,  that  some 
senator  holding  the  opposite  opinions  should  also 
appeal  to  the  "higher  law"  which  the  South 
erners  had  already  invoked,  and  should  say  that 
he  did  not  so  read  the  Bible  and  the  Constitu- 


94  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

tion,  though  he  also  found  them  both  In  accord, 
—  the  one  a  gospel  of  freedom,  not  a  decree  of 
bondage,  and  the  other  a  charter  of  liberty,  not 
a  law  of  servitude. 

The  rest  of  Seward's  speech  was  devoted  to 
considering  the  argument  that  the  Union  was 
in  danger,  and  could  only  be  saved  by  compro 
mise.  He  was  but  little  moved  by  the  threats  and 
passionate  talk  of  dissolving  the  Union,  unless 
satisfactory  concessions  were  made  to  slavery. 
He  attached,  or  professed  to  attach,  but  little 
importance  to  them  ;  but  the  Southern  leaders 
and  many  of  their  followers  were  in  deadly  ear 
nest  and  meant  all  that  they  said.  The  Soutli- 
,ern  heart,  however,  had  not  yet  been  thoroughly 
fired,  the  slave  states  had  made  no  preparations 
for  secession,  there  had  been  no  single  act  or 
even  fancied  aggression  of  which  they  could 
complain ;  and  they  knew  that,  while  Taylor 
lived,  there  could  be  no  peaceable  separation, 
that  he  considered  secession  to  be  treason  and 
would  not  hesitate  to  treat  it  accordingly.  Ten 
years'  delay,  and  the  complaisance  of  a  Presi 
dent  as  feeble  and  vacillating  as  Taylor  was 
prompt  and  resolute,  were  needed  to  complete 
their  preparations  and  put  them  in  readiness 
for  action.  That  Seward  saw  any  part  of  this 
is  more  than  doubtful.  He  thought  the  Union 
practically  indissoluble,  because  the  centripetal 


CALIFORNIA   AND    THE    COMPROMISES.       95 

and  conservative  forces  seemed  to  him  much 
stronger  than  the  centrifugal.  It  seemed  to  him 
that  the  South,  on  reflection,  would  realize  that, 
if  there  were  to  be  a  dissolution,  the  probable 
line  of  cleavage  would  run  north  and  south,  fol 
lowing  the  great  river.  He  could  not  believe 
that  the  people  of  the  South,  when  it  came  to 
the  point,  would  be  willing  to  say  to  the  civilized 
world  that  they  had  seceded  from  the  Union, 
in  order  to  establish  a  government  of  which 
African  slavery  should  be  the  corner-stone,  and 
its  maintenance  and  perpetuity  the  final  cause. 
Animated  as  he  personally  was  by  the  convic 
tion  that  slavery,  which  he  had  abhorred  since 
the  youthful  days  of  his  teaching  in  Georgia, 
must  give  way  before  the  light  of  modern  civili 
zation,  he  felt  confident  that  the  Southerners, 
looking  at  the  question  calmly,  would  at  last 
prefer  that  the  Union  should  stand,  and  slavery 
"  disappear  gradually,  voluntarily,  and  with  com 
pensation,"  rather  than  that  the  Union  should 
be  dissolved,  and,  as  he  foresaw,  "  civil  war  and 
violent,  complete,  and  immediate  emancipation 
follow."  The  day,  he  trusted,  was  far  off,  when 
the  fountains  of  popular  content  should  be 
broken  up  ;  but  should  it  ever  come,  he  felt  cer 
tain  that  it  would  show  "  how  calmly,  how  firmly, 
how  nobly  a  great  people  can  act  in  preserving 
their  Constitution." 


96  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

At  this  time,  Clay,  Calhoun,  Webster,  and 
Seward  practically  represented  all  the  shades 
of  public  opinion  in  the  different  sections  of 
the  country  on  the  subject  of  slavery,  except 
the  views  of  the  radical  abolitionists.  Clay, 
recognizing  the  existing  antagonism  between 
the  North  and  South  arising  from  the  various 
questions  connected  with  slavery,  thought  that, 
if  some  arrangement  could  be  made  by  which 


--  arise^and  this  disturbing 

anTdangerous  elementwonlri   bo   pmrmvr.fl   £i:nm 


our  politics.  Calhoun  considered  any  such  com 
promise  as  a  mere  palliative.  In  his  opinion  the 
Union  was  oj^y  ?  pnrnppcJL_between  two  classes 
of  equal,  sovereign  states,  one  class  having  slaves 
and  the  other  not ;  and  there  must  be  an  exact 
equilibrium  of  political  powQi*  ^ft twpftn -4hftsft  twA 
classes,  or  the  compact  could  not  be  permanent. 
Webster  believed  that  the  gain  to  mankind  by 
the  maintenance  and  perpetuation  of  fhp  TTnlrm 
would  far  outweigh  any  loss  or  injury  from 
concessions  ton  or  compromises  withr  slavery 
and_the  slave  stages.  Seward  thought  that  the 
slave  states  and  slaveholdersjyvprp,  p.ntiiLad-to  the 
exact  rights  a™^  pr?vi^gnn  wliirh  thn  Onn^ti 
tution  gave  them,  but  to  npthin,0;  ^0^0 ;  that 
slavery  was  a 
that  under.no  compulsion  and  by  no  persuasion 


CALIFORNIA   AND    THE    COMPROMISES.       97 

would  he  ever  consent  to  give  it  one  hair's 
breadth  of  advantage  not  distinctly  secured  to 
it  by  the  compromises  of  the  Constitution. 

After  a  debate,  protracted  more  than  two 
months,  Clay's  resolutions,  with  the  amend 
ments  and  the  substitutes  proposed  by  other 
senators,  were  referred  to  a  committee  of  thir 
teen,  of  which  he  was  chairman.  A  month 
later  this  committee  reported  three  bills.  The 
first  of  these  made  two  amendments  to  the  fugi 
tive  slave  bill  then  pending  before  the  Senate ; 
the  second  put  an  end  to  the  use  of  the  District 
of  Columbia  as  a  public  slave  mart  for  the 
states.  The  third  was  a  bill  of  thirty-nine  sec 
tions,  —  the  first  four  of  which  provided  for  the 
admission  of  California,  the  next  seventeen  gave 
Utah  a  territorial  government,  and  prohibited 
the  territorial  legislature  from  passing  any  law 
as  to  African  slavery.  Seventeen  more  sections 
provided  a  similar  government  for  New  Mexico. 
The  last  section  contained  a  proposition  to  Texas 
as  to  the  settlement  of  her  boundaries.  This 
third  bill  soon  became  known  as  "  the  Omnibus 
bill." 

Those  Southerners  who  had  always  opposed 
Clay's  resolutions  at  once  attacked  this  "  Omni 
bus  bill,"  and  all  through  the  hot  and  sultry 
summer  the  debate  went  on,  personal,  acrimoni 
ous,  eager,  passionate.  The  Southern  senators 


98  WILLIAM   HENRY  SEWARD. 

were  unwearied  in  their  efforts  to  gain  here  or 
there  something  more  than  the  bill  gave  them. 
They  endeavored  to  limit  the  southern  boundary 
of  California  to  the  line  of  the  Missouri  Com 
promise,  and  to  provide  for  a  slave  state  out  of 
the  territory  thus  cut  off,  —  to  obtain  a  distinct 
recognition  of  what  they  claimed  to  be  their  con 
stitutional  right  to  carry  slaves  into  New  Mexico 
and  hold  them  there,  though  the  laws  of  that 
country  abolishing  slavery  had  never  been  re 
pealed, —  and  also  to  secure  an  admission  of  the 
power  of  the  territorial  legislatures  to  pass  laws 
for  the  protection  of  slavery,  but  not  for  its  pro 
hibition.  Clay,  in  spite  of  his  years  and  feeble 
ness,  was  indefatigable  in  defense  of  the  com 
mittee,  and  in  his  endeavors  to  pass  the  bill ; 
but  all  was  in  vain.  By  successive  amendments 
it  was  gradually  reduced  to  a  simple  act  to  pro 
vide  a  territorial  government  for  Utah ;  and  so 
mutilated,  it  passed  the  Senate  on  the  last  day 
of  July. 

Before  this  happened,  Taylor,  after  a  short 
illness,  had  died.  So  long  as  he  lived,  Clay 
had  against  him,  not  so  much  Taylor's  active 
opposition,  as  the  knowledge  of  every  senator 
that  this  plan  was  not  the  President's  or  ap 
proved  by  him,  and  that  he  had  said  to  a 
senator  who  was  opposed  to  the  compromise 
measures:  "Stand  firm,  don't  yield."  But 


CALIFORNIA   AND    THE    COMPROMISES.       99 

when   Fillmore  succeeded  Taylor,  he  called  to 
his   cabinet   Webster   and  Corwin,  the  leading 
compromisers  from  the  free  states,  and  exerted 
all  the  influence  of  his  administration  to  secure 
the  passage  of  the   Omnibus   Bill.      Contrary, 
however,  to  the  expectation  of  its  advocates,  it 
turned  out  that  the  tacking  together  of  so  many 
incongruous  matters  was  a  source  of  weakness, 
that  it  served  to  combine  the  opponents  rather 
than  to  unite  the  friends  of  the  separate  meas 
ures,  and  so  brought   about  the  defeat  of  the 
entire    bill.       All    the    measures    recommended 
by  the  committee  were,  however,  carried  later, 
each  in  a  separate  act.     It  is  the  fashion  to  talk 
of  these  as  compromise  measures,  but  it  is  in 
a  certain  sense  a  misnomer ;  they  did  not  as  a 
whole  receive  the  support  of  a  majority  of  the 
committee  of  thirteen,  less  than  one  third  of  its 
members  voting  for  all  the  bills.     The  separate 
acts  were  carried  by  different  combinations  of 
senators,  only  eighteen   senators  voting  for  all 
the  bills  as  passed ;  of  these,  twelve  were  North 
ern    Democrats,   one   a   Northern   Whig    from 
Pennsylvania  ;  four  were  Southern  Whigs,  and 
one,  Houston,  of  Texas,  a  Southern  Democrat. 
The  analysis   shows   that  it  was  not  to  be  ex 
pected  that  measures,  which  taken  as  a  whole 
found  so  little  general  support,  could  be  a  final 
settlement  of  all  questions  as  to  slavery. 


100  WILLIAM  UENRY   SEWARD. 

Had  Taylor  lived,  the  compromise  measures 
would  probably  have  failed  to  pass  in  any  form. 
The  threats  of  disunion  had  steeled  him  against 
concessions  to  the  demands  of  the  South.  "I 
am  pained  to  learn,"  said  he,  "  that  we  have  dis 
union  men  to  deal  with.  Disunion  is  treason." 
It  seems  the  very  irony  of  fate  that  this  South 
ern  President,  for  whom  so  many  Northern 
Whigs  hesitated  or  refused  to  vote,  because  he 
was  a  slaveholder  and  the  representative  of 
slaveholding  interests,  should  have  been  aban 
doned  by  the  great  leaders  of  the  party  upon 
such  a  question,  and  should  have  stood  without 
their  support,  an  immovable  bulwark  against  the 
slaveholders,  in  spite  of  Southern  pressure  and 
Northern  weakness.  Webster  thought  Taylor's 
death  delivered  the  country  at  that  time  from 
the  horrors  of  civil  war ;  and  later  writers  have 
said  that  "the  slaveholding  states  would  have 
been  more  able  to  hold  their  own  in  1850  than 
they  proved  to  be  in  1861."  But  secession,  had 
it  been  then  attempted,  would  have  lost  the  ten 
years  of  organization  and  preparation  secured 
by  delay,  and  would  have  encountered  the  iron 
will  and  firm  resolve  of  a  Southern  soldier,v. 
who  would  have  acted  while  others  talked,  and 
whose  well  known  character  would  have  made 
the  stoutest  secessionist  hesitate  before  he  took 
the  fatal  step  which  separates  declamation  from 


CALIFORNIA    AND    THE    COMPROMISES.    101 

action.  The  South  did  not  secede  in  1850  be 
cause  the  masses  were  not  ready:  to. do  so,  and 
because  the  leaders  knew  weU  what  they  might 
expect  from  the  President.  Had?  atiy  st?,t«  ecua- ; 
mitted  a  single  overt  act  of  rebellion,  there  would 
have  been  at  once  a  resort  to  force.  The  offend 
ers  would  have  been  quickly  reduced  to  obedi 
ence,  but  slavery  would  have  been  untouched, 
and  the  whole  battle  would  have  remained  to 
be  fought  out  at  a  later  day. 

The  death  of  Taylor  made  a  great  difference 
in  Seward's  political  weight  in  the  Senate ;  he 
had  been  recognized  as  the  advocate,  if  not  the 
official  representative  of  the  President's  policy, 
and  this  position  lent  additional  importance  to 
his  words.  But  he  had  no  such  relations  with 
Fillmore.  On  the  contrary,  though  in  their 
early  political  days  both  Fillmore  and  Seward 
had  been  anti-Masons,  and  both  were  original 
members  of  the  Whig  party,  yet  each  of  them 
had  his  own  friends  and  followers,  who  looked 
to  him  when  in  office  or  power  for  crumbs  from 
the  political  feast ;  and  there  was  early  estab 
lished  between  them  or  their  partisans  a  rivalry 
in  the  prosecution  of  claims  for  spoils.  When 
questions  as  to  slavery  first  became  prominent, 
their  opinions  seemed  substantially  the  same ; 
but  later,  while  Seward  grew  more  outspoken 
against  slavery,  Fillmore  became  more  conserv- 


102  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ative  and  cautious.  When  Fillmore  was  nom 
inated  for.  -vifce-  president,  he  was  understood 
fo  represent  'the  anti-Seward  wing  of  the  Whig 
party  >  2nd  the*  probability  of  difficulties  from 
the  counter-claims  to  office  of  their  respective 
supporters  was  so  fully  recognized,  that  an  at 
tempt  was  made  to  effect  an  amicable  arrange 
ment  between  them  as  to  the  division  of  places ; 
but  it  did  not  succeed.  Some  of  Fillmore's 
friends  were  first  served ;  but  the  fact  that  the 
governor  and  state  authorities  of  New  York  be 
longed  to  the  Seward  wing  of  the  party,  which 
was  far  more  numerous  than  Fillmore's,  and 
that  to  this  wing  Taylor  was  principally  indebted 
for  the  vote  of  the  state,  made  it  essential  that 
this  wing  should  be  chiefly  recognized  in  the 
distribution  of  offices. 

The  change  in  the  attitude  of  the  administra 
tion  towards  the  compromise  measures,  which 
occurred  on  Fillmore's  accession  to  office,  did  not 
affect  Seward's  position  regarding  them,  or  that 
of  the  Whigs  who  were  his  followers.  The 
Whig  papers  in  the  state  of  New  York  which 
had  hitherto  opposed  them  continued  to  do  so, 
and  President  Fillmore  became  prescriptive.  He 
removed  the  Albany  postmaster,  a  friend  of  the 
editor  of  the  Albany  "  Evening  Journal,"  a  paper 
outspoken  in  its  hostility  to  the  compromises; 
and  the  whole  influence  of  his  administration 


CALIFORNIA   AND    THE    COMPROMISES.    103 

was  exerted,  in  vain,  to  prevent  the  Whig  state 
convention  of  New  York,  in  the  autumn  of 
1850,  from  passing  any  resolution  approving 
Seward's  course.  The  president  of  the  conven 
tion  was  one  of  the  conservative  Whigs,  or,  as 
they  were  afterwards  called,  Silver  Greys ;  he 
appointed  a  committee  on  resolutions,  so  se 
lected  as  to  make  it  sure  that  they  would  let 
Seward  severely  alone.  But  when  they  made 
their  report,  a  resolve  indorsing  Seward's  course 
was  moved  as  an  amendment  and  carried  by  a 
handsome  majority.  The  administration  mem 
bers  of  the  convention  thereupon  withdrew  to 
another  hall  and  indorsed  the  President  and 
the  compromises.  In  the  Senate,  within  three 
weeks  after  Taylor's  death,  a  Southern  senator 
threatened  to  move  Seward's  expulsion  ;  and  as 
he  himself  wrote :  "  By  the  advent  of  Mr.  Fill- 
more  "  he  "  was  buried  below  low-water  mark." 
The  compromise  measures,  passed  as  separate 
bills  before  the  adjournment  of  Congress  in  Sep 
tember,  1850,  and  which  were  practically  all  the 
work  of  the  session,  conceded  to  the  North  the 
admission  of  California  as  a  free  state,  and  the 
abolition  of  the  slave  trade  in  the  District  of 
Columbia  ;  to  the  South,  territorial  governments 
for  New  Mexico  and  Utah,  with  no  exclusion 
of  slavery,  the  adjustment  of  the  boundary  line 
between  New  Mexico  and  Texas,  so  as  to  give 


104  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

Texas  a  large  area  which  she  had  never  occupied 
or  governed  while  an  independent  republic,  the 
payment  to  her  of  ten  million  dollars  for  relin 
quishing  a  purely  paper  and  nominal  claim  to 
still  more  of  New  Mexico,  and  the  enactment  of 
a  new  and  more  stringent  law  for  the  recovery 
of  fugitive  slaves.  These  measures  were  pro 
claimed  to  be  a  final  settlement  of  the  whole 
slavery  question,  which  had  thus  become  a  dead 
issue. 

Perhaps  the  compromises  would  have  allayed 
the  excitement,  and  have  been  accepted  at  the 
North  with  practical  unanimity,  but  for  the  fugi 
tive  slave  law.  But  this  law  was  odious  to  the 
communities  in  which  it  was  to  be  enforced.  It 
contained  no  statute  of  limitations ;  it  permitted 
the  recapture  of  runaways,  who  had  been  for 
years  residents  in,  and  had  become  citizens  of, 
the  different  free  states.  The  proceedings  were 
assumed  to  be  analogous  to  those  by  which  a 
person  charged  with  a  crime  in  a  state  from 
which  he  has  fled  is  surrendered  to  take  his  trial 
there ;  and  the  statute  was  so  drawn  that  colored 
persons  alleged  to  be  fugitive  slaves  could  be 
arrested  upon  ex  parte  affidavits  and  hurried 
into  slavery  upon  the  production  of  mere  formal 
proofs,  with  no  opportunity  to  try  the  question 
of  their  freedom  in  the  States  where  they  were 
living  and  where  all  the  testimony  tending  to 


AN  JL  v  ij 


CALIFORNIA  AND   THE   COMPROMISES.    105 

establish  this  was  naturally  to  be  found.  While, 
as  if  to  make  the  statute  still  more  offensive 
to  the  North,  it  was  provided  that  the  commis 
sioners  who  were  to  administer  the  law  should 
receive  a  fee,  when  the  alleged  fugitive  was 
returned,  twice  as  large  as  that  to  which  they 
would  be  entitled  if  the  captive  were  discharged. 
Had  the  law  been  less  arbitrary  and  brutal,  had 
it  provided  some  safeguards  for  freedom,  some 
remedies  for  mistakes  of  identity,  had  it  made 
any  concessions  to  Northern  sentiment  and  to 
the  civilization  of  the  nineteenth  century,  the 
people  of  the  free  states  might  have  permanently 
acquiesced  in  it  as  a  legitimate  mode  of  fulfill 
ing  an  obligation  which  the  Constitution  im 
posed  on  them,  repugnant  to  their  conscience 
and  feelings  as  that  obligation  was.  But  the 
actual  statute  was  a  mere  firebrand  flung  among 
the  opponents  of  slavery  at  the  North,  and  every 
case  that  arose  added  fuel  to  the  spreading 
flames  of  the  popular  excitement  against  it. 


CHAPTER  VI. 
FILLMORE'S  ADMINISTRATION. 

AFTER  the  passage  of  the  compromise  meas 
ures,  there  was  a  lull  in  the  great  contest 
between  freedom,  and  slavery,  as  often  after  a 
battle  both  combatants  seek  repose,  and  time  to 
recruit  their  strength  before  renewing  the  con 
flict  ;  and  this  truce  lasted,  with  no  signs  of  any 
new  struggle,  until  the  close  of  Fillmore's  admin 
istration  in  1853. 

The  congressional  session  of  1850-51  was 
politically  unimportant.  It  was  yet  too  soon 
for  either  the  North  or  the  South  to  declare  that 
the  compromise  measures  were  not  a  finality; 
although  in  the  free  states  many  meetings,  with 
resolutions  indorsing  the  fugitive  slave  law  and 
declaring  an  unfaltering  determination  to  ex 
ecute  it,  and  a  deluge  of  pamphlets  and  sermons 
by  its  supporters,  lay  and  clerical,  were  found 
necessary  to  offset  the  meetings,  speeches,  and 
sermons  of  its  opponents,  and  to  endeavor  to 
overcome  the  hostility  of  the  North  to  its  en 
forcement.  In  November,  1850,  Mr.  Webster 
wrote  to  the  President  from  Boston  :  "  There  is 


FILLM ORE'S  ADMINISTRATION.  107 

now  no  probability  of  any  resistance  if  a  fugi 
tive  should  be  arrested."  Yet  only  three  months 
afterwards  a  negro,  arrested  as  a  fugitive  slave, 
was  rescued  from  the  court  house  there  at  high 
noon  and  successfully  carried  to  Canada ;  and  in 
spite  of  the  utmost  exertions  on  the  part  of  the 
government,  no  one  was  ever  convicted  of  tak 
ing  part  in  his  escape.  Quite  as  significant  of 
the  public  opinion  of  the  North,  though  in  a 
different  way,  was  the  election  to  the  Senate 
from  New  York,  Fillmore's  own  state,  of  Ham 
ilton  Fish,  an  opponent  of  the  compromises,  as 
Seward's  colleague ;  while  Ohio  sent  Benjamin 
Wade,  a  most  outspoken  Free  Soiler  ;  and  in 
Massachusetts,  though  only  by  a  bargain  for 
offices  between  Democrats  and  Free  Soilers, 
Charles  Sumner,  an  exponent  of  the  extreme 
anti-slavery  opinion,  though  not  a  political  abo 
litionist,  succeeded  Webster  in  the  Senate. 

Though  "political  ends,  and  not  real  evils 
resulting  from  the  escape  of  slaves,  constituted 
the  prevailing  motives  for  the  enactment  of  the 
fugitive  slave  law,"  yet,  in  fact,  during  the  first 
year  after  its  passage,  more  persons  were  seized 
as  fugitive  slaves  than  in  the  preceding  sixty 
years.  This  statement,  however,  does  not  imply 
so  much  as  it  seems  to.  From  many  of  the 
New  England  states  no  slave  had  ever  been 
taken  back,  and,  except  from  Massachusetts,  not 


108  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

one  from  any  of  them  for  at  least  a  quarter  of  a 
century.  There  was,  even  so  early  as  February, 
1851,  some  foundation  for  the  complaint  that 
bad  faith  threw  all  kinds  of  difficulties  in  the 
way  of  the  recovery  of  fugitives,  often  increas 
ing  the  cost  to  the  full  value  of  the  slave. 
Charges  of  this  kind  became  doubtless  more 
and  more  true  as  time  went  on,  and  the  con 
stantly  growing  hostility  to  the  law  continually 
invented  new  and  fresh  obstacles  to  its  speedy 
and  peaceful  execution.  There  were  other  res 
cues,  and  an  occasional  murder  either  of  pur 
suers  or  pursued,  or  the  killing  by  a  mother  of 
her  children  that  they  might  not  be  sent  back  to 
slavery.  These,  with  some  kidnappings,  and  the 
not  infrequent  return  to  slavery,  under  the  sum 
mary  processes  of  the  law,  of  free  colored  per 
sons,  kept  alive  the  public  feeling,  and  tended 
slowly  to  consolidate  into  a  new  party  the  plain 
people  of  the  Northern  states,  who  did  not  live 
by  commerce  or  manufactures,  and  had  no  direct 
dealings  or  intercourse  with  the  South. 

Even  in  Congress  there  was  a  certain  recog 
nition  of  the  fact  that  the  finality  of  the  com 
promises  might  be  questioned.  Before  the  end 
of  January,  1851,  forty-four  senators  and  repre 
sentatives  of  different  political  parties,  with  Clay 
himself  at  their  head,  thought  it  advisable .  to 
publish  a  manifesto,  declaring  that  they  would 


FILLMORE'S  ADMINISTRATION.  109 

support  no  man  for  office  who  did  not  condemn 
any  disturbance  of  the  compromises,  or  agita 
tion  of  the  slavery  question.  Yet  congressional 
action  on  this  subject  was  not  always  consistent 
with  what  this  declaration  implied.  A  bill  to 
construe  the  fugitive  slave  law  so  as  to  increase 
its  rigor  was  introduced  into  the  Senate  a  few 
days  later,  and  at  once  referred  to  a  committee, 
while  petitions  for  its  repeal  were  refused  such 
reference,  and  immediately  laid  on  the  table. 
Yet  even  as  to  these  the  rule  was  not  uniform, 
such  a  petition  presented  by  Seward  being  sum 
marily  disposed  of,  while  similar  petitions  pre 
sented  by  senators  from  Maine  and  Pennsylvania 
were  appropriately  referred. 

In  a  short  speech  on  this  matter,  Seward, 
alluding  to  the  charge  of  being  an  agitator, 
said  :  "  I  am  one  of  the  members  of  this  body 
who  have  been  content  with  the  debates  which 
were  had  when  this  subject  came  legitimately 
before  us  in  the  form  of  bills  requiring  debate. 
I  have  never  spoken  on  the  subject  since  those 
bills  became  laws.  I  have  been  content  to  leave 
those  measures  to  the  scrutiny  of  the  people,  and 
the  test  of  time  and  truth.  I  have  added  no 
codicils  and  have  none  to  add,  to  vary,  enforce  or 
explain  what  I  had  occasion  to  say  during  the 
debates." 

This  declaration  was  true,  and  his  conduct  in 


110  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

this  matter  eminently  characteristic.  He  was 
no  agitator  for  agitation's  sake.  He  recognized 
the  fact  that  the  country  was  for  the  moment 
worn  out  with  discussion,  that  it  was  hopeless 
to  attempt  to  rouse  the  people  by  declamation, 
and  that  only  concrete  facts  of  wrong  and  out 
rage,  which  he  felt  sure  would  not  fail  to  occur, 
could  do  this. 

There  were  other  subjects  besides  slavery  dis 
cussed  in  the  session  of  1850-51,  —  a  French 
Spoliation  Bill,  which  Seward  supported  in  an 
elaborate  speech,  the  improvement  of  rivers  and 
harbors,  the  disposition  of  the  public  lands,  and 
changes  in  our  postal  system.  In  his  views  on 
this  last  subject,  Seward  was  distinctly  a  re 
former,  and  in  advance  of  the  times.  He  could 
not  secure  cheap  postage  ;  but  it  was  to  his  exer 
tions  at  this  session  that  we  owe  our  street  letter 
boxes  and  the  first  attempt  at  delivery  by  letter- 
carriers  in  the  cities  and  towns. 

The  summer  of  1851  saw  the  opening  of  the 
Erie  Railway  to  the  lakes ;  the  President  and 
many  of  his  cabinet  and  Seward  with  them 
made  an  excursion  over  the  whole  length  of  the 
road,  and  there  were  banquets  and  speeches  and 
fireworks  and  all  the  other  festivities  common 
to  such  occasions.  To  the  "  Silver  Greys,"  the 
Whigs  who  had  indorsed  the  administration 
and  the  compromises,  the  chief  of  the  "  Woolly 


FILLMORE'S   AD^fINISTRATION.  111 

Pleads  "  must  have  seemed  an  undesirable  ad 
dition  to  the  presidential  party  on  this  pro 
longed  excursion ;  and  Seward  himself  felt  that 
there  might  be  some  embarrassment  from  his 
presence.  But  the  construction  of  this  railway 
had  been  one  of  his  early  and  constantly  cher 
ished  projects,  and  he  would  have  been  reluctant 
to  miss  "  the  wedding  of  the  lakes  to  the  salt 
sea  with  the  ring  of  well  wrought  iron."  This 
was  his  holiday  for  the  year;  he  spent  the  rest 
of  his  summer  in  the  trial  of  an  important  and 
fatiguing  criminal  case. 

Both  sessions  of  the  thirty-second  Congress 
(December,  1851,  to  March  4,  1853),  were  in 
striking  contrast  to  those  of  the  previous  one. 
Instead  of  stormy  discussion,  hard  feelings,  bit 
ter  words,  and  unbecoming  personalities,  there 
was  courtesy,  fair  debate,  and  general  kindliness 
and  good  feeling.  In  the  opening  days  of  the 
first  session,  resolutions  were  introduced  in  the 
Senate  affirming  the  finality  of  the  compromise 
measures ;  but  the  discussion  of  these,  except  in 
a  single  instance,  was  carried  on  between  the 
Southern  senators,  and  the  resolutions  them 
selves  were  never  pressed  to  a  vote.  In  Missis 
sippi,  where  the  issue  had  been  distinctly  raised 
between  secession  or  the  Union  with  compro 
mises,  Foote,  the  compromise  Union  candidate, 
was  elected  governor  over  Jefferson  Davis,  the 


112  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

nominee  of  the  pronounced  Secessionists.  A 
South  Carolina  convention,  called  to  promote  the 
cause  of  disunion,  collapsed ;  and,  so  far  as  the 
South  was  concerned,  it  was  evident  that  no 
further  concessions  to  the  slaveholding  interests 
were  to  be  asked  for  at  present.  At  the  North 
the  number  of  cases  under  the  fugitive  slave  law 
seemed  to  diminish.  There  was  consequently 
less  general  excitement  about  it,  though  there 
were  occasional  bursts  of  indignation,  when  the 
popular  passions  in  some  locality  broke  out  in 
a  flame ;  but  the  flame  never  spread  into  a  con 
flagration,  and  the  elections  in  1852  showed 
that,  on  the  whole,  public  opinion  was  inclined 
to  abide  by  the  compromise  measures  and  not 
to  disturb  them. 

The  event  of  the  winter  (1851-52)  which  prin 
cipally  excited  Congress  and  the  country  was  the 
visit  of  Kossuth  and  his  companions,  who  had 
been  leaders  in  the  Hungarian  insurrection  of 
1848.  The  efforts  of  the  Hungarians  to  estab 
lish  a  republic  had  seemed  on  the  point  of  success, 
when  the  forces  which  Russia  sent  the  Austrian 
emperor  at  his  request,  joined  to  his  own  army, 
enabled  him  to  crush  the  rebellion.  The  Czar, 
who  had  refused  to  aid  Austria  so  long  as  the 
Hungarians  were  merely  seeking  reforms,  justi 
fied  his  interference  when  they  had  undertaken 
to  form  a  republic,  upon  the  ground  that  "  the 


FILLMORE'S  ADMINISTRATION.  113 

internal  security  of  his  empire  was  menaced  by 
what  was  passing  and  preparing  in  Hungary." 
Upon    their    final    defeat,    Kossuth    and    other 
Hungarians  escaped  to  Turkey.       The  Sultan, 
supported    by    England,    refused    to    surrender 
them ;  and  the  Congress  of  the  United  States, 
acting  on  the  belief  that  these  refugees  wished 
to  leave  Europe  forever,  and  to  seek  new  homes 
here,  gave  them  passage  to  this  country  in  a 
national  vessel.     Kossuth,  however,  leaving  the 
ship  at   Gibraltar,   went   directly  to   England, 
where  he  was  received  with  an  enthusiasm  which 
grew  day  by  day.     During  his  visit  there  he  put 
before  the  people  in  public  addresses  of  marvel 
ous  eloquence,  tinged  with  oriental  thought  and 
fancy,  and  clothed  in  the  language  of  Shake 
speare,  the  only  English  he  knew,  vivid  pictures 
of  the  wrongs  and  oppression  of  his  country.    He 
made  it  evident  that  it  was  his  purpose  to  in 
duce  both  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States 
to  acknowledge  that  it  was  their  duty  to  protest 
against   the   action  of  any   state  which  should 
assist    another   to    put  down    an    insurrection  ; 
and  although   he  did  not   expressly  say  so,  he 
evidently  expected  them  to  be  prepared,  if  ne 
cessary,  to  support  their  protests  by  force.     As 
an  earnest  of  their  assent  to  this  principle,  he 
wished  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States  each 
to  put   on   record  its   official   and   public  con- 


114  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

damnation  of  the  recent  intervention  of  Rus 
sia  in  the  affairs  of  Hungary,  and  his  hope  was, 
under  cover  of  this  declaration,  to  start  a  fresh 
insurrection  there  with  a  better  prospect  of  suc 
cess. 

After  a  short  stay  in  England,  he  sailed  for 
New  York,  where  he  was  to  arrive  early  in 
December.  On  the  very  clay  that  Congress  as 
sembled  in  that  month,  a  resolution  was  intro 
duced  in  the  Senate,  at  the  instance,  it  was  said, 
of  the  secretary  of  state,  providing  for  the  wel 
come  and  reception  of  the  Hungarian  patriots. 
It  was  expected  to  pass  at  once  and  unanimously, 
but  it  was  opposed,  and  was  therefore  not  pressed. 
A  substitute  offered  by  Seward,  simply  giving 
Kossuth  "  a  cordial  welcome  to  the  capital  and 
and  the  country,"  was  adopted  by  both  houses 
after  some  debate.  The  small  minority  against 
it  consisted,  with  a  single  exception,  of  South 
erners,  whose  opposition  to  the  resolve,  as  one 
of  them  declared,  "  had  been  guided  solely  by 
sensitiveness  on  the  subject  of  slavery."  Some 
Southerners,  whose  sympathies  had  been  excited 
for  the  defeated  leaders  of  an  unsuccessful  rising 
in  a  remote  land,  and  who  had  been  quite  ready 
to  invite  them  here  as  "  exiles  broken  in  heart 
and  fortune,"  desirous  only  "  to  spend  their  re 
maining  days  in  obscure  industry,"  were  quick 
to  take  alarm  when  they  found  Kossuth  preach- 


FILLMOEE'S   ADMINISTRATION.  115 

ing  a  crusade  in  favor  of  freedom  and  the  rights 
of  men,  and  when  they  witnessed  the  effect  of 
his  fervid  appeals  upon  all  classes  of  persons  at 
the  North.  For  it  was  not  merely  the  more 
impressionable  and  uncritical  masses  who  were 
carried  away  by  his  eloquence  ;  but  grave  profes 
sors,  scholars,  and  men  of  letters,  the  intelligent, 
refined,  and  fastidious  people  of  the  land  were 
equally  moved  by  him ;  and  the  slaveholders  not 
unreasonably  apprehended  that  the  quickened 
sense  of  the  wrongs  of  a  people  suffering  under 
the  yoke  of  a  despotism,  might  intensify  and 
deepen  the  growing  conviction  at  the  North  of 
the  greater  wrongs  and  sufferings  of  a  people 
borne  down  by  the  still  heavier  yoke  of  slav 
ery.  The  fact  that  the  most  earnest  anti-slavery 
leaders  were  among  the  most  ardent  of  Kos- 
suth's  admirers  naturally  tended  to  increase 
these  apprehensions.  Kossuth  made  a  tour  of 
the  South ;  but  though  he  preserved  a  discreet 
silence  on  the  subject  of  slavery,  his  speeches 
failed  to  awaken  there  any  interest  for  Hungary. 
Some  of  the  men  in  public  life  undoubtedly 
used  the  Hungarian  question  for  political  pur 
poses.  Seward  took  it  up  in  dead  earnest.  He 
offered  in  the  Senate  a  resolution  which  de 
nounced  the  conduct  of  Russia  in  invading  Hun 
gary  without  just  right,  in  subverting  there  the 
constitution  established  by  the  people,  and  re- 


116  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

ducing  the  country  to  the  condition  of  a  province 
ruled  by  a  foreign  power ;  and  which  further 
declared  that  the  United  States,  in  defense  of 
their  own  interests  and  of  the  common  interests 
of  mankind,  protested  against  this  conduct  of 
Russia,  as  a  wanton  and  tyrannical  infraction 
of  the  law  of  nations,  and  would  not  in  future 
be  indifferent  to  any  similar  acts  of  national  in 
justice,  oppression,  or  usurpation,  wherever  they 
might  occur.  In  a  very  earnest  and  elaborate 
speech  he  urged  the  passage  of  this  resolve.  He 
admitted  that  it  would  have  been  better  had  we 
made  our  protest  before  the  final  defeat  and  sur 
render  of  the  Hungarians ;  but  thought  this  of 
the  less  consequence,  as  the  surrender  was  quite 
recent,  and  there  was  some  prospect  of  a  new 
rising  in  Hungary,  which  made  the  protest  im 
portant  and  seasonable.1  We  had  an  interest  in 
making  this  protest,  he  said,  as  one  of  the  family 
of  nations,  and  so  deeply  concerned  in  their 
general  welfare  that  it  was  not  merely  our  right 
but  our  duty  to  do  this. 

Nor  did  he  see  any  real  objection  to  it.     A 

1  The  final  defeat  and  surrender  of  the  Hungarians  was 
August  10-13,  1849.  This  speech  was  delivered  March  9, 
1852.  As  neither  this  country  nor  England  gave  Hungary 
official  encouragement  there  was  never  any  later  outbreak. 
The  ninety  thousand  dollars  ($90,000)  raised  in  this  country 
by  subscription,  for  the  Hungarian  cause,  was  all  spent  for 
the  benefit  of  those  who  came  over  here. 


FILLMORE'S   ADMINISTRATION.  117 

protest  was  "  not  a  declaration,  nor  a  menace, 
nor  even  a  pledge  of  war  in  any  contingency." 
It  was  only  "  a  remonstrance  addressed  to  the 
conscience  of  Russia,  and  an  appeal  to  the  reason 
and  justice  of  mankind.  By  the  law  of  nations," 
he  argued,  "  no  remonstrance  justifies  a  war." 
If  war  should  come,  the  protest  would  be  not  a 
cause,  but  a  "  pretext,"  and  "  in  a  defensive  war 
levied  against  us  on  such  a  pretext  we  should  be 
unconquerable."  If  Hungary  should  never  rise, 
there  would  be  no  casus  belli,  and  if  she  should 
do  so,  we  should  have  the  right  to  choose  our 
own  time  for  recognizing  her.  He  found  in  our 
civil  reply  to  Louis  XVI. 's  announcement  of  the 
formation  of  the  French  constitution  of  1791,  an 
inferential  protest  against  the  foreign  interven 
tion  then  organized  beyond  the  Rhine,  although 
the  reply  was  absolutely  silent  on  this  point; 
and  he  discovered  further  protests  of  the  same 
kind  in  the  friendly  official  messages  sent  to  the 
Committee  of  Safety  of  the  first  French  republic. 
Washington's  policy  of  avoiding  entangling 
alliances  with  European  countries  Seward  ad 
mitted  to  have  been  wise  and  necessary  in  its 
day ;  but  he  argued  that  this  policy  was  not  in 
tended  or  adapted  for  all  time  ;  that  Monroe's 
course  as  to  the  Holy  Alliance  and  the  South 
American  republics  was  a  departure  from  it ;  and 
that  his  later  expression  of  sympathy  with  Greece 


118  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

towards  the  close  of  her  long  struggle  for  inde 
pendence  was  inconsistent  with  it.  He  spoke 
with  pride  of  the  instant,  though  unauthorized, 
recognition  by  our  own  minister  of  the  French 
republic  of  1848,  as  showing  the  trend  of  our 
political  relations  and  influence  with  the  countries 
of  Europe ;  and  he  insisted  that  the  resolve  he 
offered  was  no  greater  intervention  (if  it  were 
intervention  at  all),  than  what  we  had  done  "in 
every  contest  for  freedom  and  humanity  through 
out  the  world  since  we  became  a  nation." 

Seward  had,  in  fact,  found  no  precedent  for 
any  such  protest,  in  any  act  of  our  foreign  policy 
as  to  the  domestic  difficulties  of  any  European 
state.  The  diplomatic  history  of  the  country 
afforded  no  such  precedent.  The  speech  was  one 
in  which  his  sympathies  got  the  better  of  his 
reason.  It  advocated  a  meddlesome  foreign 
policy,  inconsistent  with  the  position,  the  inter 
ests,  and  the  prosperity  of  the  United  States. 
Had  his  resolution  been  adopted,  it  would  have 
been  a  new  departure,  at  variance  with  the  estab 
lished  practice  and  traditions  of  this  country, 
and  ten  years  later  might  have  been  relied  on 
by  the  countries  of  Europe  to  justify  a  more  ac 
tive  interference  with  our  course  in  crushing  the 
Soujiern  rebellion.  The  sober  sense  of  Con 
gress  saved  us  from  the  possible  consequences  of 
Seward's  rash  and  quixotic  proposal. 


FILLMORE'S   ADMINISTRATION.  119 

In  forming  the  standing  committees  of  the 
Senate,  in  the  Congress  which  met  in  December, 
1851,  Seward  was  made  a  member  of  that  on 
commerce.  This  brought  him  into  more  familiar 
relations  with  other  senators/and  gave  him 
plenty  of  congenial  work.  He  was  always  a 
believer  in  the  development  of  the  country,  upon 
the  lines  of  the  policy  of  the  Whig  party,  and 
his  place  on  this  committee  made  more  effective 
his  endeavors  to  foster  by  legislation  our  domes 
tic  and  foreign  commerce.  He  advocated  gov 
ernment  aid  to  two  lines  of  Atlantic  steamers, 
to  the  ship  canal  round  the  Sault  Saint  Marie, 
and  to  railroads  in  various  parts  of  the  country, 
declared  himself  "  out  and  out "  in  favor  of  a 
railway  across  the  continent,  while  for  the  bene 
fit  of  our  whalers  and  trade  in  the  Pacific  he 
strenuously  urged  a  government  survey  of  that 
ocean. 

In  the  second  session  of  this  Congress  there 
were  no  political  debates.  When  the  presidential 
conventions  met,  both  parties  inserted  in  their 
platforms  an  indorsement  of  the  finality  of  the 
compromises.  That  of  the  Democrats  was  ex 
plicit,  and  adopted  unanimously;  that  of  the 
Whigs,  though  more  qualified,  was  opposed  by 
one  fourth  of  the  delegates. 

In  the  Democratic  convention  the  struggle  for 
the  nomination  was  long :  the  party  leaders,  Cass, 


120  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

Marcy  and  Buchanan,  were  all  at  last  abandoned, 
and  Franklin  Pierce  of  New  Hampshire,  who 
had  seen  some  public  service  both  in  the  House 
and  Senate  and  been  a  general  in  the  Mexican 
war,  secured  the  nomination. 

Among  the  Whigs,  Scott  was  the  candidate 
of  the  opponents  of  the  compromises  of  1850 ; 
Fillmore  and  Webster,  of  those  who  supported 
these  compromises.  In  the  convention,  Webster 
received  only  twenty-nine  votes,  while  Fillmore 
had  a  hundred  and  thirty -one,  —  enough  with 
Webster's  twenty-nine  to  have  given  him  the 
nomination.  The  conservative  Northern  and 
the  Southern  Whigs  had  together  a  majority  of 
the  convention,  and  the  indorsement  of  the 
finality  of  the  compromise  measures,  including 
the  fugitive  slave  law,  was  not  unexpected. 
Indeed,  the  outcome  of  the  convention  was 
but  another  compromise,  a  last  attempt  of  the 
Whigs  to  preserve  their  character  as  a  national 
party.  The  anti-slavery  Whigs  of  the  North 
secured  the  nomination,  the  South  the  platform. 
Seward  was  disheartened.  "  The  North,  the  free 
states,"  he  wrote,  "  are  divided  as  usual,  the 
South  united.  Intimidation,  usual  in  that  quar 
ter,  has  been  met,  as  usual,  by  concession,  and  so 
the  platform  adopted  is  one  that  deprives  Scott 
of  the  vantage  of  position  he  enjoyed.  ...  I 
anticipate  defeat  and  desertion."  He  was  so 


FILLMORE'S   ADMINISTRATION.  121 

discouraged  as  to  feel  weary  of  his  position 
and  that  he  should  be  glad  to  get  out  of  it. 
This  feeling  continued  throughout  the  summer. 
"When  will  there  be  a  North?"  he  asks;  and 
says  again :  "  I  still  remain  strongly  inclined  to 
give  up  this  place  and  public  life.  If  the  state 
Whig  convention  adopt  the  platform,  I  think  I 
shall  be  justified  in  resigning  at  once." 

The  result  of  the  election  confirmed  his  fore 
cast.  Pierce  received  two  hundred  and  fifty- 
four  electoral  votes  from  twenty-seven  States, 
while  General  Scott  had  only  the  votes  of  Ver 
mont,  Massachusetts,  Kentucky,  and  Tennessee, 
forty-two  in  all.  Pierce's  plurality  over  Scott 
on  the  popular  vote  was  more  than  two  hundred 
thousand,  and  his  majority  over  all  candidates 
nearly  sixty  thousand.  So  far  as  the  election 
had  any  political  significance,  it  showed  that  the 
Southerners  believed  the  Democrats  more  sub 
servient  to  the  slaveholding  interests  than  the 
Whigs  ;  while  it  also  indicated  that  the  majority 
of  the  Northern  voters  were  weary  of  anti-slavery 
agitation,  and  had  accepted  the  compromise 
measures  as  a  solution  of  all  difficulties,  and  as 
the  finality  which  the  platforms  of  both  parties 
asserted  them  to  be. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE   REPEAL   OF   THE   MISSOURI   COMPROMISE. 

PRESIDENT  PIERCE'S  first  message,  delivered 
on  the  5th  of  December,  1853,  called  attention  to 
the  "  sense  of  repose  and  security  in  the  public 
mind,"  and  gave  assurance  that  this  repose 
should  suffer  no  shock  if  he  had  power  to  avert 
it.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that,  at  the  time  he 
said  this,  the  President  had  not  the  slightest 
foreboding  of  the  rude  shock  which  this  repose 
was  at  once,  with  his  own  assent  and  support, 
to  receive  at  the  hands  of  his  own  party. 

The  Louisiana  purchase,  the  territory  acquired 
from  France  by  the  Treaty  of  1803,  extending 
west  from  the  Mississippi  to  the  Rocky  Moun 
tains,  first  brought  into  our  politics  the  disturb 
ing  factor  of  the  extension  of  slavery  ;  all  our 
previous  holdings  being  free  under  the  Ordi 
nance  of  1787.  After  a  sharp  contest  the  ques 
tion  of  freedom  or  slavery  in  this  territory  was 
settled  by  a  compromise,  by  which  Missouri  was 
admitted  as  a  slave  state ;  and  in  all  the  rest  of 
the  territory  slavery  was  to  be  allowed  south  of 
36°  30',  while  north  of  this  latitude  it  was  for 
ever  prohibited. 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI    COMPROMISE.     123 

By  this  bargain  between  the  sections,  the 
South  secured  all  the  rich  and  fertile  lands  from 
the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi  to  the  northern 
border  of  Missouri,  and  left  to  the  North  the  un 
inhabited  regions  beyond,  stretching  westward 
to  the  Rocky  Mountains,  which  were  abandoned 
to  the  hunter  and  trapper,  or  gradually  given 
over  to  Indian  reservations.  In  1836,  Missouri 
obtained  leave  of  Congress  to  extend  her  bound 
aries  westward  to  the  Missouri  River,  and  thus 
more  than  three  thousand  square  miles,  which 
the  Compromise  had  made  free,  became  slave  ter 
ritory.  Aside  from  this,  however,  the  Missouri 
Compromise  remained  practically  unquestioned 
from  its  passage  in  March,  1820,  until  the  year 
1853,  and  had  been  regarded  as  hardly  less  sa 
cred  and  binding  than  the  Constitution  itself. 
But  the  South  had  now  reaped  the  full  benefit 
of  all  it  had  secured  by  the  bargain  ;  and  the 
inhabitants  of  the  southwestern  counties  of  Mis 
souri,  with  their  twenty -five  thousand  slaves, 
were  looking  with  covetous  eyes  upon  the  fair 
lands  of  Kansas,  lying  just  beyond  their  own 
borders. 

Several  attempts  had  been  made  to  secure 
from  Congress  an  act  for  the  organization  of  a 
territorial  government,  in  conformity  with  the 
provisions  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  ;  but  they 
had  all  been  defeated  by  Southern  votes,  osten- 


124  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEW  AMD. 

sibly  upon  the  ground  that  this  territory  could 
not  be  opened  to  settlement  without  interfer 
ence  with  Indian  reservations  secured  by  solemn 
treaties.  Within  ten  days  after  the  delivery 
of  the  President's  message,  with  its  promise  of 
repose,  a  similar  bill  was  introduced  into  the 
Senate  and  referred  to  the  committee  on  territo 
ries,  of  which  Stephen  A.  Douglas  of  Illinois  was 
chairman.  Three  weeks  later  the  committee 
returned  it  with  amendments,  accompanied  by 
an  elaborate  report,  in  which  it  was  said  that  it 
was  a  disputed  point  whether  the  Compromise 
prohibiting  slavery  in  this  territory  was  a  valid 
enactment  ;  eminent  statesmen  holding  that  Con 
gress  had  no  authority  to  legislate  as  to  slavery 
in  the  territories,  that  the  Constitution  secured 
to  every  citizen  an  inalienable  right  to  move  into 
any  territory  with  any  property,  including  slaves, 
and  to  have  the  same  protected  by  law,  and  that 
any  legislation  interfering  with  or  restricting 
this  right  was  null  and  void.  The  committee 
added  that  they  did  not  recommend  any  legis 
lation  either  affirming  or  repealing  the  Missouri 
Compromise,  or  declaring  the  meaning  of  the 
Constitution  upon  this  disputed  question  ;  but 
then  went  on  to  say  that  the  compromise  meas 
ures  of  1850  rested  upon  the  proposition  that  all 
questions  pertaining  to  slavery  in  the  territories, 
or  in  the  states  to  be  formed  therefrom,  should 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.     125 

be  left  to  the  decision  of   the  people  residing 
therein. 

The  purpose  and  effect  of  this  report  did  not 
escape  the  notice  of  the  vigilant  anti- slavery 
press  of  the  North.1  Nor  was  the  hint  at  its 
close  wholly  lost  on  the  South.  On  the  16th 
of  January,  a  Southern  senator  gave  notice  of 
an  amendment  repealing  so  much  of  the  Mis 
souri  Compromise  as  prohibited  slavery  in  this 
territory,  and  providing  that  slaves  might  be 
taken  there  as  if  that  act  had  never  been  passed. 
A  week  later,  after  a  Sunday's  conference  with 
the  President,  in  which  Pierce  at  last  yielded 
to  the  arguments  and  persuasion  of  Jefferson 
Davis  and  Douglas,  Douglas  again  reported  the 
bill  from  his  committee,  and  now  there  was  no 
uncertainty  as  to  its  meaning.  It  created  two 
territories,  Kansas  the  southern  one,  and  north 
of  this  Nebraska.  It  provided  that  slavery  in 
these  territories  should  be  left  to  the  decision 
of  the  people  there,  and  declared  the  Missouri 
Compromise  inconsistent  with  the  principle  of 
the  Acts  of  1850  and  therefore  inoperative  and 
void.  The  bill  in  this  shape  passed  the  Senate 
by  a  vote  of  thirty-seven  yeas  to  fourteen  nays, 
-  all .  the  Southerners,  of  whatever  party,  ex 
cept  Bell  of  Tennessee  and  Houston  of  Texas, 

1  New  York  Evening  Post,  January  7,  1854  ;  Tribune,  Janu 
ary  11,  Independent,  January  7. 


126  WILL. AM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

voting  for  it,  and  only  four  Northern  Democrats 
against  it.1 

When  Douglas  reported  his  bill,  he  readily 
granted  its  opponents  a  week's  delay  before  it 
should  be  brought  up  for  discussion.  In  this 
interval  there  was  published  the  address  of  the 
"  Independent  Democrats,"  in  which  the  whole 
history  of  the  growth  and  development  of  the 
bill  was  exposed,  the  report  attacked,  and  a 
strenuous  effort  made  to  rouse  the  people  of  the 
North  to  a  sense  of  the  wrong  attempted  to  be 
done  them,  and  of  the  threatened  danger  to  free 
dom.  This  address  was  signed  by  Chase  and 
Sumner  of  the  Senate  and  three  members  of  the 
House.  Seward  did  not  sign  it,  and  it  is  obvi 
ous  that  he  could  not  have  done  so.  He  was 
not  an  Independent  Democrat ;  he  was  a  Whig, 
and  there  was  no  reason  for  his  signing  it  which 
did  not  apply  equally  to  the  other  anti-slavery 
Whigs  in  the  Senate,  —  Fessenden,  Foote,  Fish, 
Smith,  and  Wade,  none  of  whom  put  their 
names  to  it. 

When  the  day  for  the  debate  arrived,  Doug 
las,  assuming  that  the  delay  had  been  asked  to 
gain  time  to  stir  up  sectional  agitation  at  the 
North,  made  a  savage  attack  on  Chase  and 

1  Seven  Whigs  including  Bell,  five  Democrats  including 
Houston,  with  Chase  and  Sumner,  Independents,  made  up  the 
minority. 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.     127 

Sumner,  the  senators  responsible  for  this  mani 
festo,  and  on  them,  for  the  time,  came  the  brunt 
of  the  battle  against  the  bill.  Before  its  final 
passage  Seward  made  two  speeches  upon  it. 
It  was  a  case,  however,  where  discussion  was 
useless.  Douglas  had  brought  the  bill  to  its 
final  shape,  providing  for  the  organization  of 
two  territories  with  no  restriction  as  to  slavery, 
because  (if  we  are  to  take  his  own  explanation) 
he  thought  some  organization  of  these  territories 
a  pressing  necessity,  and  was  satisfied  that  the 
South  would  assent  to  no  other  plan. 

The  Southerners  were  perfectly  well  aware  of 
what  they  were  doing.  They  knew  that  they 
were  breaking  a  bargain  of  which  they  had 
reaped  the  advantage,  and  they  were  at  bottom 
quite  indifferent  to  the  charges  of  bad  faith  and 
to  all  the  reproaches  heaped  upon  them.  They 
expected  to  gain  an  immediate  substantial  ad 
vantage  for  slavery,  and  did  not  mind  the  ex 
posure  of  the  flimsy  and  shifting  pretexts  which 
they  offered  in  justification  of  their  conduct. 
They  had  the  united  Southern  vote,  which 
was  pro-slavery  and  "knew  no  Whiggery  and 
no  Democracy  where  slavery  was  concerned  ; " 
and  they  could  rely  on  a  sufficient  number  of 
Northern  Democrats  to  carry  any  measure  on 
which  they  had  determined.  To  the  Senate, 
therefore,  argument  was  vain,  and  invectives 


128  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

and  personalities  were  useful  only  to  relieve 
the  mind  of  the  speaker.  Whatever  was  said 
was  a  mere  protest,  unavailing  where  it  was 
spoken.  "We  were  only  a  few  here,"  said 
Seward,  "  engaged  in  the  cause  of  freedom  in 
the  beginning  of  this  contest.  All  that  we 
could  hope  to  do  was  to  organize  and  prepare 
the  issue  for  the  House  of  Representatives,  and 
awaken  the  country." 

Seward's  first  speech  was  a  simple  but  ex 
haustive  statement  of  the  whole  question  in  all 
its  bearings,  entirely  free  from  personalities,  and 
with  little  rhetorical  adornment.  Its  tone  was 
one  of  great  calmness,  and  its  calmness  made  it 
all  the  more  effective.  It  has  been  described 
as  a  lawyer's  argument.  If  it  was  so,  the  jury 
to  whom  it  was  addressed  was  the  people  of  the 
United  States,  and  its  effect  upon  them  was  all 
that  Seward  himself  could  have  desired. 

"His  words  were  listened  to  not  only  by  his 
followers  in  New  York,  but  they  had  a  marked 
influence  on  all  the  anti-slavery  Whigs  in  the 
country.  The  speech  was  translated  into  Ger 
man,  and  extensively  circulated  among  the  Ger 
mans  of  western  Texas.  It  probably  affected 
the  minds  of  more  men  than  any  speech  de 
livered  on  that  side  of  this  question  in  Con 
gress."  l  Having  stated  the  history  of  the  ac- 
i  Rhodes's  Hist.  U.  S.  I  pp.  453,  454. 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.     129 

quisition  of  the  territory  and  of  the  passage  of 
the  Compromise  bill,  which  had  secured  it  to 
freedom,  the  "  universal  acceptance  of  this  meas 
ure  by  both  parties  for  more  than  thirty  years, 
as  a  conclusive  arrangement,  its  confirmation 
over  and  over  again  by  many  acts  of  successive 
congresses,  and  the  fact  that  the  slaveholding 
states  had  received  the  full  benefit  of  what  the 
Compromise  secured  them,  while  the  non-slave- 
holding  states  had  practically  enjoyed  nothing 
under  it,"  Seward  went  on  to  consider  the 
nature  of  the  question  and  the  momentous  con 
sequences  depending  upon  its  decision.  "  It 
was  no  abstraction  that  had  brought  the  Com 
promise  into  being.  Slavery  and  freedom  were 
then  active  antagonists,  seeking  for  ascendency 
in  the  Union ;  and  the  contest  between  them 
had  since  that  day  been  merely  protracted  — 
not  decided.  By  holding  fast  to  the  Compro 
mise,  the  occupation  of  the  land  by  freemen,  with 
free  labor,  would  be  secured  forever ;  by  abro 
gating  it,  this  vast  region  was  to  be  abandoned 
to  the  chances  of  slavery,  which  no  one  could 
foretell."  He  announced  his  conviction  that 
if  ever  the  slaveholding  states  should  "  multiply 
themselves  and  extend  their  sphere,  so  that  they 
could,  without  association  with  the  non-slave- 
holding  states,  constitute  of  themselves  a  com 
mercial  republic,  from  that  day  their  rule  would 


130  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

be  such  as  would  be  hard  for  the  non-slavehold- 
ing  states  to  bear;  and  their  pride  and  ambition 
would  consent  to  no  union  in  which  they  should 
not  so  rule." 

Notwithstanding  the  compromise  measures 
of  1850,  Seward's  observation  and  his  natural 
optimism  had  made  him  hopeful  that  anti-slav 
ery  opinion  was  gaining  ground,  and  the  coun 
try  making  slow  progress,  with  occasional  draw 
backs,  towards  the  gradual  and  peaceful  emanci 
pation  which  he  ardently  desired.  The  intro 
duction  of  Douglas's  original  bill  at  this  session 
of  Congress,  and  the  support  which  it  at  once 
received  from  Northern  Democrats,  was  a  rude 
shock  to  this  hope ;  and  Seward's  letters  at  this 
time  are  full  of  gloomy  forebodings.  He  wrote 
home :  — 

"  Douglas  has  introduced  a  bill  for  organizing 
the  Nebraska  territory,  going  as  far  as  the  Dem 
ocrats  dare  towards  abolishing  that  provision  of 
the  Missouri  Compromise  which  devoted  all  the 
new  regions  north  of  36°  30'  to  freedom. 

"  I  am  heart-sick  of  being  here.  I  look  around 
me  in  the  Senate,  and  find  all  demoralized. 
Maine,  New  Hampshire,  Connecticut,  Ehode 
Island,  Vermont ! ! !  All,  all  in  the  hands  of 
the  slaveholders ;  and  even  New  York  ready  to 
howl  at  my  heels,  if  I  were  only  to  name  the 
name  of  freedom,  which  once  they  loved  so 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.      131 

much."  1  To  an  invitation  to  a  meeting  in  New 
York  to  protest  against  the  bill,  he  replied: 
"  Nebraska  is  not  all  that  is  to  be  saved  or  lost ; 
we  who  thought,  only  so  lately  as  1849,  of  secur 
ing  some  portion  at  least  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico 
and  all  the  Pacific  coast  to  the  institutions  of 
freedom,  shall  be,  before  1857,  brought  to  a 
doubtful  struggle  to  prevent  the  extension  of 
slavery  to  the  shores  of  the  Great  Lakes  and 
Puget  Sound."  2  And  as  the  vote  was  about  to 
be  taken  in  the  Senate,  before  sending  the  bill 
to  the  House,  he  wrote  again :  "  Heaven  be 
thanked  that  since  this  cup  of  humiliation  cannot 
be  passed,  the  struggle  of  draining  it  is  nearly 
over.  .  .  .  This  triumph  of  slavery,  the  greatest 
and  the  worst,  is  the  consummation  of  thirty -four 
years  of  compromise."  3 

In  Mr.  Welles's  "Lincoln  and  Seward,"  which 
was  written  rather  from  a  controversial  than  a 
historical  point  of  view,  he  prints  a  letter  from 
Mr.  Montgomery  Blair,  in  which  Mr.  Blair  says  : 
"I  shall  never  forget  how  shocked  I  was  at 
Se ward's  telling  me  that  he  was  the  man  who  put 
Archie  Dixon,  the  Whig  senator  from  Kentucky 
in  1854,  up  to  moving  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise  as  an  amendment  to  Douglas's  first 
Kansas  bill ;  and  had  himself  forced  the  repeal 
by  that  movement,  and  had  thus  brought  to  life 
1  January  4, 1854.  2  January  28, 1854.  3  March  3, 1854. 


132  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

the  Republican  party.  Dixon  was  to  out-Herod 
Herod  at  the  South,  and  he  would  out-Herod 
Herod  at  the  North.  He  did  not  contemplate 
what  followed.  He  did  not  believe  in  the  reality 
of  the  passions  he  excited,  because  he  felt  none 
himself.  He  thought  it  all  a  harmless  game  for 
power."  This  statement  of  Mr.  Blair's,  though 
apparently  relied  on  by  some  careful  writers, 
seems  to  show  so  great  forgetfulness  or  ignorance 
of  historical  facts,  or  such  a  reckless  disregard 
of  them,  as  greatly  to  impair,  if  not  wholly  to 
destroy  its  claim  to  serious  consideration ;  but 
as  a  malignant  posthumous  attack  on  Seward, 
it  justifies,  if  it  does  not  require,  even  at  the 
risk  of  repetition,  some  notice  here. 

The  principal  historical  facts,  which  dispose 
of  Mr.  Blair's  charge  that  Seward  forced  the 
repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  by  putting 
up  Dixon  of  Kentucky  to  move  it,  are  as  fol 
lows  :  early  in  December,  1853,  Dodge  of  Wis 
consin  introduced  into  the  Senate  a  bill  for  organ 
izing  into  one  territory,  to  be  called  Nebraska, 
the  whole  country  stretching  west  from  Mis 
souri  to  Oregon  and  Utah.  All  this  region 
had  been  declared  free  by  the  Missouri  Com 
promise,  and  Dodge's  bill  assumed  this  to  be 
constitutional  and  still  in  force,  unaffected  by 
any  subsequent  legislation.  His  bill  was  re 
ferred  to  the  committee  on  territories,  of  which 


REPEAL    OF   MISSOURI    COMPROMISE.      133 

Stephen  A.  Douglas  of  Illinois  was  chairman, 
and  that  committee,  on  the  4th  of  January, 
1854,  reported  the  bill  in  a  new  draft,  or,  to 
speak  accurately,  substituted  for  Dodge's  bill 
one  of  their  own.  They  also  submitted  an  elab 
orate  report,  in  which  they  said  that  "  it  was 
disputed  whether  the  law  prohibiting  slavery  in 
Nebraska  was  valid ;  that  there  was  involved 
in  it  the  question  whether  Congress  had  the 
constitutional  power  to  regulate  the  domestic 
institutions  of  the  territories,  —  the  same  issue 
which  produced  the  struggle  of  1850,  —  that 
they  thought  it  wise  not  to  depart  from  the 
course  pursued  at  that  time,  and  would  not 
recommend  either  affirming  or  repealing  the 
Missouri  Compromise,  or  the  passage  of  any  act 
declaratory  of  the  meaning  of  the  Constitution 
on  this  point."  Nevertheless  their  bill,  when  it 
first  appeared  in  print  as  an  act  of  twenty  sec 
tions,  on  the  7th  of  January,  1854,  contained 
provisions  borrowed  from  the  laws  organizing 
Utah  and  New  Mexico,  by  which,  whenever  this 
or  any  part  of  this  new  territory  should  be  ad 
mitted  as  a  state,  its  admission  should  take 
place  without  regard  to  the  fact  that  its  consti 
tution  permitted  or  prohibited  slavery.  This 
provision  was  a  violation  of  the  spirit,  if  not  also 
of  the  letter,  of  the  Missouri  Compromise,  and 
an  application  to  this  territory  of  the  doctrine 


134  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

of  squatter  sovereignty  as  established  by  the 
compromise  measures  of  1850. 

Three  days  later  (January  10,  1854),  there 
was  printed  an  additional  section  (the  twenty- 
first)  said  to  have  been  omitted  by  a  mistake  of 
the  copyist  in  the  original  draft  of  the  bill.  This 
section  contained  several  paragraphs.  It  declared 
that  it  was  the  intent  of  the  act,  so  far  as  slavery 
was  concerned,  to  carry  into  effect  the  principles 
established  by  the  compromise  measures  of  1850; 
and  specified  as  the  first  of  these  principles  that 
"  all  questions  pertaining  to  slavery  in  the  terri 
tories,  and  in  the  new  states  to  be  formed  there 
from,  are  to  be  left  to  the  decision  of  the  people 
residing  therein,  through  their  appropriate 
representatives."  If  there  had  previously  been 
any  doubt  as  to  the  purpose  and  effect  of 
Douglas's  bill,  this  new  section  made  its  scope 
and  object  perfectly  clear;  and  Douglas  was 
quite  right  when  he  said  at  a  later  date  that 
"  the  bill,  in  the  shape  in  which  it  was  at  first 
reported,  as  effectually  repealed  the  Missouri 
restriction,  as  it  did  when  the  repeal  was  put 
in  express  terms."  The  country  understood  the 
bill  in  this  way,  and  leading  newspapers  at  once 
exposed  its  character. 

Seward  so  understood  it,  and  before  the  10th 
of  January  (the  day  when  the  additional  section 
first  appeared)  had  written  of  it  as  "  this  infa- 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.      135 

mous  Nebraska  bill,  an  administration  move ; " 
and  called  attention  to  its  clause  protecting 
Indians  in  their  rights  of  property,  which  he 
declared  to  be  "  an  equivoque  to  cover  the  slaves 
the  Indians  own,  and  so  sanction  slavery  by 
implication."  He  had  also  written  as  to  meet 
ings  and  legislative  resolutions  to  remonstrate 
against  it,  and  expressed  a  hope  that  Clayton 
might  be  induced  "  to  lead  an  opposition  to  the 
repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise"  l 

On  the  sixteenth  of  January,  eight  days  after 
the  date  of  this  letter,  Archibald  Dixon  of  Ken 
tucky,  who  had  been  elected  to  the  Senate  as  a 
Whig,  but  who  openly  declared  that  upon  the 
question  of  slavery  he  knew  no  Whiggery  and 
no  Democracy,  that  he  was  a  pro-slavery  man, 
was  from  a  slaveholding  constituency,  and  was 
there  to  maintain  their  rights,  gave  notice  of  an 
amendment  which  he  proposed  to  offer,  expressly 
repealing  so  much  of  the  Missouri  Compro 
mise  as  prohibited  slavery  in  this  new  territory. 
Sumner  on  the  next  day  proposed  an  amendment 
of  an  exactly  opposite  character.  The  bill  was 
recommitted;  the  following  week  Douglas  re 
ported  it  substantially  as  it  was  finally  passed  ; 
and  we  find  Seward  writing  to  his  wife :  "  The 
great  news  of  the  day  I  suppose  you  have  antici 
pated.  The  4  Hards,'  finding  fault  with  Doug- 

1  Letters,  January  8,  1854. 


TY 


136  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

las's  equivocations  in  his  first  bill,  insisted  on 
the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise.  Doug 
las  conferred  last  Sunday  with  the  cabinet ;  and 
the  matter  resulted  in  a  unanimous  agreement 
to  concede  the  demand,  and  to  put  the  bill  right 
through,  before  the  country  could  be  aroused, 
and  so  silence  agitation  of  freedom  by  leaving 
no  more  for  slavery  to  demand.  I  shall  not 
speculate  yet  on  the  consequences." 

The  course  of  events  in  the  Senate  and  the 
accounts  contained  in  these  letters  correspond 
with  one  another.  Douglas  meant  to  repeal  the 
prohibition  of  slavery  contained  in  the  Missouri 
Compromise,  but  hoped  to  do  it  indirectly,  in 
such  a  way  as  to  satisfy  the  South  without 
rousing  the  attention  or  exciting  the  opposition 
of  the  North.  He  made  two  attempts  for  this 
purpose,  —  the  second  (by  the  restoration  of  the 
suppressed  twenty -first  section)  more  explicit 
than  the  first.  But  the  friends  of  freedom  had 
seen  his  object  from  the  beginning;  they  be 
lieved,  as  he  did,  that  he  had  accomplished  it  in 
his  original  bill,  and  at  once  began  to  endeavor  to 
rouse  public  opinion  at  the  North.  The  South 
ern  slaveholders  and  the  Northern  pro-slavery 
Democrats  (the  Hards)  would  not,  however,  be 
satisfied  with  anything  less  than  a  direct  repeal 
in  clear  language.  They  persuaded  the  President 
to  assent  to  this  course,  and  Douglas  reported 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI  COMPROMISE.      137 

his  final  bill.  Dixon's  motion  was  an  incident  of 
no  special  importance.  Before  it  was  made  the 
committee  had  determined  that  their  bill  should 
open  the  territory  to  slavery,  and  believed  that 
it  had  done  so  in  the  way  to  attract  least  atten 
tion.  The  South  insisted  on  more  explicit 
language  on  this  point,  and  the  committee 
yielded  to  their  persistence.  The  final  shape  of 
the  bill,  proposing  the  organization  of  two  terri 
tories  instead  of  one,  may  have  been  expected  to 
facilitate  its  passage,  as  it  left  room  for  the  argu 
ment  that  there  was  to  be  a  division  between 
the  North  and  South,  as  often  before,  and  that 
though  Kansas,  which  was  next  Missouri,  would 
be  a  slave  state,  yet  Nebraska  was  not  likely 
to  be  so.  Nebraska  it  was  then  quite  safe  to 
talk  about,  as  its  only  denizens  were  Indians  on 
their  reservations,  and  our  hunters  and  the  game 
they  were  pursuing ;  and  there  was  no  immedi 
ate  prospect  of  any  more  stable  population. 

What  Seward  actually  said  to  Mr.  Blair,  which 
enabled  him  to  make  the  statement  he  has  printed, 
can  never  be  known,  since  Mr.  Blair,  however 
shocked  he  was,  never  mentioned  the  matter 
during  Seward's  lifetime,  when  Seward  might 
have  explained  or  denied  it,  but  reserved  it  for  an 
attack  on  him  after  his  death.  To  any  one  who 
has  studied  Seward's  life,  the  suggestion  that  in 
his  opposition  to  the  extension  of  slavery  he  was 


138  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

playing  a  part  in  "  a  harmless  game  for  power," 
is  simply  absurd.  Slavery  was  abhorrent  to 
him  from  his  early  experience  in  Georgia.  Later 
in  life  he  abandoned  a  journey  in  Virginia 
because  the  daily  contact  with  slavery  was  so 
repulsive  to  him.  He  believed  it  a  moral  wrong 
and  a  political  mistake,  and  his  whole  course  in 
politics  rested  upon  this  conviction.  The  sub 
stance  and  the  tone  of  the  letters  we  have  quoted, 
his  whole  correspondence  at  the  time,  and  his 
speech  on  the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  ai^e  abso 
lutely  inconsistent  with  his  having  "  put  up 
Dixon  "  to  moving  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise.  There  were  no  confidential  rela 
tions  between  Seward  and  Mr.  Blair  which 
would  have  naturally  led  Seward  to  make  him 
the  sole  depositary  of  this  secret ;  Blair  himself 
had  no  such  tender  regard  for  Seward's  repu 
tation  as  would  have  caused  him  to  hesitate 
for  an  instant  to  speak  of  this,  if,  at  the  time, 
he  really  understood  what  he  at  last  brought 
himself  to  state  in  this  letter.  There  were  in 
Congress,  when  the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  was 
under  discussion,  many  of  its  opponents  who 
did  not  like,  or  always  agree  with,  Seward,  and 
who  did  not  shrink  from  criticising  him,  or  say 
ing  sharp  and  unpleasant  things  about  him.  If 
there  were  any  background  of  facts  to  warrant 
Mr.  Blair's  charges,  we  may  be  quite  sure  that 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.      139 

some  rumor  of  them  would  have  been  then  cir 
culating  in  Washington,  and  that  we  should  not 
have  waited  till  twenty  years  after  the  events 
happened,  when  all  the  actors  were  dead,  before 
hearing  this  story  for  the  first  time.  Nor,  if 
there  were  any  foundation  for  Mr.  Blair's  charge 
against  him,  if  he  had  any  share  in'  Dixon's 
motion,  could  Seward  himself,  when  the  facts 
were  fresh,  and  when  the  evidence  to  convict 
him  of  falsehood,  if  what  he  was  stating  were 
untrue,  was  right  at  hand,  have  written  as  he 
did  in  the  letters  we  have  quoted,  or  have  pub 
licly  said  in  a  speech  on  this  very  bill :  "  The 
shifting  sands  of  compromise  are  passing  from 
under  my  feet,  and  they  are  now,  without  agency 
of  my  own,  taking  hold  again  on  the  rock  of  the 
Constitution." 

In  the  House  of  Representatives  there  was 
more  opposition  to  the  bill  ;  there  seemed  a 
possibility  of  its  defeat,  and  more  than  a  possi 
bility  of  some  amendments  unacceptable  to  the 
slaveholders.  But  it  was  at  last  forced  through, 
without  material  changes,  by  the  parliamentary 
skill  and  the  unhesitating  audacity  of  Alexander 
H.  Stephens  of  Georgia,  who  succeeded  most  in 
geniously  in  cutting  off  all  possible  amendments 
and  stopping  all  debate. 

A  change,  which  the  Southerners  were  pre 
pared  to  accept,  made  it  necessary  to  return  the 


140  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

bill  to  the  Senate,  that  it  might  be  put  on  its 
final  passage  there.  It  was  on  the  night  before 
this  final  vote  was  taken  that  Seward  made  his 
second  speech ;  and  the  despondency  betrayed 
in  his  correspondence  is  even  more  manifest 
here. 

"  The  sun  has  set,"  he  began,  "  for  the  last 
time  on  the  guaranteed  and  certain  liberties  of 
all  the  unsettled  and  unorganized  portions  of 
the  United  States.  To-morrow's  sun  will  rise  in 
dim  eclipse  over  them.  How  long  that  obstruc 
tion  shall  last  is  known  only  to  the  Power  that 
directs  and  controls  all  human  events.  For  my 
self,  I  know  only  this,  that  no  human  power  will 
prevent  its  coming  on,  and  that  its  passing  off 
will  be  hastened  and  secured  by  others  than 
those  now  here,  and  perhaps  only  by  those  be 
longing  to  future  generations.  .  .  .  By  the  pas 
sage  of  this  bill,  freedom  will  endure  a  severe, 
though,  I  hope,  not  an  irretrievable  loss.  .  .  . 
The  slave  states  are  in  earnest  in  seeking  for 
and  securing  an  object,  and  an  important  one. 
I  do  not  know  how  long  the  advantage  gained 
will  last,  nor  how  great  and  comprehensive  it 
will  be.  .  .  .  There  is  suspended  on  the  issue 
of  this  contest  the  political  equilibrium  between 
the  free  and  the  slave  states.  It  is  no  idle  ques 
tion,  whether  slavery  shall  go  on  increasing  its 
influence  over  the  central  power  here,  or  whether 


REPEAL    OF  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.      141 

freedom  shall  gain  the  ascendency.  ...  I  be 
lieve  that,  if  ever  the  greater  ascendency  of  the 
slave  power  shall  come,  the  voice  of  freedom 
will  cease  to  be  heard  in  these  halls,  whatever 
may  be  the  evils  and  dangers  which  slavery  shall 
produce.  .  .  .  When  freedom  of  speech  on  a 
subject  of  such  vital  interest  shall  have  ceased 
to  exist  in  Congress,  then  I  shall  expect  to  see 
slavery  not  only  luxuriating  in  all  new  territo 
ries,  but  stealthily  creeping  into  the  free  states 
themselves.  Believing  this,  ...  I  am  sure  that 
this  will  be  no  longer  a  land  of  freedom  and 
constitutional  liberty,  when  slavery  shall  have 
thus  become  paramount."  It  was,  therefore, 
rather  with  the  courage  of  despair  than  with  the 
confidence  of  hope  that  he  said :  "  Come  on, 
then,  gentlemen  of  the  slave  states.  Since  there 
is  no  escaping  your  challenge,  I  accept  it  in  be 
half  of  the  cause  of  freedom.  We  will  engage 
in  competition  for  the  virgin  soil  of  Kansas, 
and  God  give  the  victory  to  the  side  which  is 
stronger  in  numbers  as  it  is  in  right." 

The  only  gleam  of  satisfaction  that  he  could 
see  came  from  his  conviction  that  the  so-called 
final  arrangements  with  the  South,  made  only  to 
be  broken,  were  forever  at  an  end. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE   FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN   PARTY. 

THE  vote  on  the  Nebraska  bill  again  demon 
strated  that  all  questions  touching  the  interests 
of  slavery  lay  outside  of  the  creeds  of  parties, 
and  the  ties  of  party  associations.  The  disin 
tegration  of  the  Whig  party  seemed  inevitable. 
Every  Northern  Whig,  in  either  House  or  Sen 
ate,  voted  against  the  bill ;  while  of  the  South 
ern  Whigs,  twenty-one  voted  for  it  and  only 
eight  against  it.  Among  the  Democrats  the  sec 
tional  lines  were  not  so  sharply  drawn ;  fifty-eight 
Northern  Democrats  voted  for  the  bill,  and  forty- 
eight  against  it ;  while  from  the  South  but  three 
voted  against  it,  fifty-eight  for  it. 

From  the  Northern  Democracy,  as  an  anti- 
slavery  party,  there  was  nothing  to  be  hoped, 
and  the  people  as  well  as  the  politicians  were 
discussing  whether  it  was  more  advisable  to  make 
a  fight  against  slavery  under  the  Whig  name 
and  organization  at  the  North,  or  to  form  a  new 
party.  Already,  before  the  passage  of  the  bill, 
there  had  been  meetings  in  Wisconsin  to  con 
sider  a  fusion  of  the  Whigs,  Free  Soilers,  and 


FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN  PARTY.     143 

anti- slavery  Democrats  into  a  new  party,  for 
which  the  name  "  Republican  "  had  been  sug 
gested.  The  day  after  the  passage  of  the  bill 
some  thirty  members  of  Congress  agreed  to 
gether  upon  the  necessity  for  a  new  party,  and 
adopted  the  same  name;  and  in  the  summer 
there  were  in  several  states,  under  varying 
forms,  fusions  between  the  anti-Nebraska  mem 
bers  of  the  different  parties,  and  elections  to 
local  offices  of  candidates  who  represented  the 
various  organizations  which  had  united  to  form 
•a  common  opposition  to  the  constant  demands 
of  slavery.  In  Michigan  the  new  organization 
was  complete.  It  held  a  regular  convention, 
called  itself  the  "  Republican  party,"  nomi 
nated  its  candidates  and  elected  them. 

Something  had  been  said,  even  before  the 
passage  of  the  bill,  as  to  calling  a  convention  of 
all  the  free  states ;  and  Seward  in  reply  to  this 
suggestion  had  given  his  opinion  that  "  we  were 
not  yet  ready  for  a  great  national  convention  ;  " 
that  the  states  were  the  places  for  activity. 
"  Let  us  make  our  power  respected,  as  we  can, 
through  our  elections  in  the  states,  and  then 
bring  the  states  into  general  council." 

The  difficulties  in  the  way  of  any  fusion  of  the 
old  parties  were  much  greater  in  the  East  than 
in  the  West ;  for  at .  the  East  the  animosities 
were  much  stronger  between  the  various  politi- 


144  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

cal  elements  from  which  the  opponents  to  the 
Nebraska  bill  were  drawn. 

There  were  several  distinct  bodies.  The 
Northern  Whigs,  who  on  this  question  were  a 
unit,  were  divided  into  at  least  two  groups,  — 
those  who  had  opposed  the  compromises  of 
1850,  the  Seward  Whigs  we  may  call  them,  — 
and  those  who  had  favored  those  compromises, 
the  Webster  Whigs.  The  former  were  the 
more  numerous,  and  had  been  recruited  by  the 
addition  of  most  of  the  young  Whigs ;  the 
strength  of  the  latter  was  in  the  cities  and  with 
the  older,  richer,  and  more  influential,  classes. 
Of  the  former  Seward  was  the  leader  ;  but  by 
the  latter  he  was  looked  upon  with  distrust  and 
dislike.  If  the  houses  of  some  of  the  conserva 
tives  in  New  York  were  again  opening  to  him, 
the  Webster  Whigs  of  Boston  ignored  his  exist 
ence  even  at  a  later  period  ;  and  when  he  came 
to  Massachusetts  in  December  of  the  following 
year  (1855)  to  deliver  an  oration  at  Plymouth, 
though  his  arrival  had  been  announced  in  the 
newspapers,  no  one  of  them  called  upon  him, 
and  he  passed  a  day  in  Boston,  alone  in  a  hotel 
parlor,  reading  Lewes's  "Life  of  Goethe."  For 
the  Whigs  of  this  class  he  had  gone  too  fast 
and  too  far.  To  the  Free  Soilers  who  had  been 
Democrats,  and  to  those  Democrats  who  had 
opposed  the  Nebraska  bill,  he  was  objection- 


FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN  PARTY.     145 

able,  as  having  been  always,  upon  all  the  eco 
nomic  questions  which  had  divided  the  two 
great  parties,  a  pronounced  Whig.  For  the  suc 
cessful  formation  of  a  new  national  party,  it 
was  essential  that  Seward  should  lend  to  the 
movement  his  active  assistance,  if  he  must  not 
indeed  lead  in  it ;  yet  the  politicians  were  too 
much  afraid  of  the  opposition  to  him  from  va 
rious  quarters  to  put  him  at  its  head,  and,  as 
he  thought,  would  have  liked  him  to  do  the 
work  and  decline  the  honors.  He  wrote  to  his 
wife :  "  I  have  letters  of  all  sorts ;  .  .  .  the 
amount  of  which  is  that,  insomuch  as  I  am  too 
much  of  an  anti-slavery  man  to  be  proscribed  by 
anti-slavery  men,  and  yet  too  much  of  a  Whig 
to  be  allowed  to  lead,  that  I  am  in  the  way  of 
great  movements  to  make  a  Democratic  anti- 
slavery  party  .  .  .  which  would  revolutionize  the 
government  at  once. 

"  Then  again,  I  am  so  important  to  the  Whig 
party  that  it  cannot  move  without  me  ;  but  that 
party  (the  Webster  part  of  it)  is  so  jaundiced 
toward  me,  that  I  am  expected  to  decline  being 
a  candidate  right  off,  and  go  in  for  some  other 
Whig  candidate,  and  so  carry  the  election  for 
the  Whig  party. 

"  The  Free  Soilers  are  engaged  in  schemes  for 
nominating  Colonel  Benton  and  dissolving  the 
Whig  party ;  .  .  .  and  there  are  not  less  than 


146  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

half  a  dozen  parties  coming  to  negotiate  witli  me 
as  if  I  were  a  vendor  of  votes." 

All  that  he  saw  and  learned  increased  his 
doubts  whether  the  various  opponents  of  the 
Nebraska  bill  were  yet  prepared  so  to  subordi 
nate  their  differences  as  to  work  together  har- 

O 

moniously  and  earnestly  for  a  common  end,  and 
confirmed  his  opinion  that  the  time  was  not  ripe 
for  a  national  experiment,  but  for  separate  efforts 
in  the  states,  where  success  would  be  more  prob 
able  and  more  encouraging,  and  where  failure 
would  be  less  disastrous  and  demoralizing.  This 
course  seemed  all  the  more  judicious,  as  there 
was  no  national  contest  this  year,  and  separate 
congressional  districts  could  arrange,  each  in 
its  own  way,  for  the  election  of  anti-Nebraska 
congressmen,  more  effectually  than  if  they  were 
in  any  degree  under  the  control  of  a  new  party 
organization. 

It  presently  appeared  also  that  there  was  a 
new  element  to  be  taken  into  account  in  any 
political  calculation  :  —  the  mysterious  appari 
tion  of  a  new  party,  the  "  Dark  Lantern,"  the 
"  Know-nothing  "  or  "  Native  American  "  party, 
which  was  both  a  political  organization  and  a 
secret  order,  whose  ostensible  purpose  was  to 
check  the  power  and  restrict  the  numbers  of 
foreign-born  citizens  by  a  rigorous  enforcement 
and  the  ultimate  modification  of  the  existing 


FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN  PARTY.     147 

naturalization  laws,  to  purify  the  ballot,  and  to 
resist  all  attempts  to  exclude  the  Bible  from  the 
public  schools ;  in  other  words  it  seemed  to  be 
a  union  of  American  Protestants  against  Irish 
Roman  Catholics.  It  originated  in  New  York 
in  1853,  and  its  avowed  objects  appealed  to 
many  people  in  that  and  other  large  cities  of 
the  East,  where  the  influx  of  illiterate  foreigners 
was  the  greatest,  and  abuses  of  the  naturaliza 
tion  laws  most  frequent.  Conservative  men  all 
over  the  country  who  had  been  Whigs,  and  who 
realized  that  this  party,  as  a  national  organiza 
tion,  was  dead,  joined  the  order  in  the  hope  that 
questions  as  to  slavery  might  be  put  aside  by 
these  new  issues,  which  had  nothing  sectional 
about  them.  It  was  the  only  refuge  for  a  South 
ern  Whig ;  and  Northern  Whigs,  who  could  not 
bring  themselves  to  strike  hands  with  Seward 
and  the  advance  guard  of  their  old  party,  found 
here  an  escape  from  so  doing.  It  became  dis 
tinctly  a  Union-saving  party  in  November,  1854, 
when  it  introduced  into  its  ritual  a  third,  or 
Union,  degree,  and  conferred  it  on  the  initiates 
with  an  imposing  ceremonial.  Before  this  time, 
however,  there  were  not  wanting  zealous  anti- 
slavery  men  who  had  seen  that  the  Know-no 
thing  organization  might  be  used  as  an  instru 
ment  in  breaking  up  the  old  parties  and  aiding 
the  formation  of  a  new  one,  and  who  joined  it  for 


148  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

this  purpose.  They  were  sufficiently  numerous 
in  many  states  to  influence  the  nominations,  and 
to  take  care  that  the  candidates  for  Congress 
should  be  in  harmony  with  their  views. 

The  Know-nothings  were  badly  defeated  in 
Virginia  in  the  spring  of  1855,  and  their  national 
council,  in  June  of  that  year,  was  hopelessly 
divided  by  sectional  strife,  yet  in  the  elections 
of  1854  they  had  been  formidable  opponents, 
all  the  more  so  because  nothing  was  known  of 
them,  of  their  methods,  their  power  or  their 
numbers.  In  Philadelphia,  where  they  were 
supposed  to  be  very  numerous,  Douglas  de 
nounced  them  bitterly  in  a  campaign  speech, 
hoping  in  this  way  to  deter  Democrats  from 
joining  the  organization,  and  to  secure  for  his 
party  the  full  Irish  vote. 

Seward,  whose  hostility  to  any  political  pro 
scription  on  account  of  birth,  race  or  religion, 
was  of  long  date  and  had  often  been  stated  by 
him  in  public  addresses  and  letters,  took  no 
part  in  the  campaign.  His  silence  has  been 
criticised.  But  whether  considered  with  refer 
ence  to  his  own  personal  interest  in  his  reelection 
to  the  Senate  or  to  the  success  of  the  party, 
it  seems  to  have  Jt>een  judicious.  It  may  be 
doubted  whether,  when  the  largest  national 
issue  to  which  he  could  address  himself  was 
practically  that  of  his  own  reelection,  he 


FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN  PARTY.     149 

would  have  thought  it  becoming  the  dignity  of 
his  position  to  enter  the  lists  as  a  campaign 
speaker  on  his  own  behalf.  It  was  well  under 
stood  too,  that  many  Whigs,  who  looked  on  him 
with  jaundiced  eyes,  had  joined  the  new,  myste 
rious  company  with  its  secret  affiliations.  The 
Whig  party  of  New  York  had  declined  all  alli 
ances  whatsoever,  adhered  to  its  old  organization, 
and  placed  itself  squarely  on  anti-Nebraska 
ground  ;  nothing  that  Seward  could  have  said 
would  have  detached  a  single  "  Silver  Grey " 
neophyte  from  his  allegiance  to  the  new  order, 
though  it  might  have  lost  him  the  vote  of  some 
Know-nothing,  who  had  a  more  vivid  interest  in 
the  struggle  against  a  manifest  and  growing  evil 
at  home,  than  in  a  crusade  to  secure  the  freedom 
of  a  region  so  remote  as  Kansas.  In  the  state 
of  New  York  the  Whigs  carried  their  ticket 
by  a  plurality  of  only  three  hundred  in  a  vote  of 
nearly  half  a  million.  A  change  of  one  hundred 
and  fifty-five  votes  would  have  elected  the  Dem 
ocratic  candidates. 

Early  in  February  of  the  following  year,  Sew 
ard  was  reflected  senator ;  and  this  reelection, 
considering  his  antecedents,  was  as  severe  a  blow 
as  could  have  been  dealt  the  Know-nothings 
at  that  time.  The  earnest  members  of  that 
party  had  set  their  hearts  on  his  defeat ;  but  the 
result  showed  that,  when  an  issue  was  raised 


150  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

between  Anti-slavery  and  Americanism,  there 
were  members  of  that  party,  at  least  in  the 
legislature  of  Seward's  own  state,  who  were 
opponents  of  slavery  before  they  were  Know- 
nothings. 

This  campaign  and  election,  which  seemed  to 
Seward  a  victory  for  himself  as  well  as  his 
party,  was  to  bear  for  him  most  bitter  fruit. 
Horace  Greeley,  who  was  generally  considered 
at  that  time  an  unselfish  patriot,  but  had  at 
bottom  an  unsatisfied  desire  for  a  nomination, 
as  a  recognition  from  his  party,  had  set  his 
heart  on  being  the  Whig  candidate  for  gov 
ernor;  and  had,  as  both  he  and  his  friends 
thought,  every  reason  to  expect  this.  In  spite 
of  Greeley's  ability,  his  advocacy  of  various 
hobbies  and  crotchets  of  his  own  had  led  so 
many  sensible  people  to  doubt  his  judgment, 
that  it  was  feared  that  his  name  on  the  ticket, 
when  success  was  at  the  best  so  uncertain, 
would  insure  its  defeat,  and  he  did  not  receive 
the  nomination;  while  to  make  matters  worse 
a  rival  editor —  Henry  J.  Raymond,  of  the 
"New  York  Times"  —  was  nominated  and 
elected  as  lieutenant  -  governor.  For  all  this 
Greeley  chose  to  consider  Seward  responsible, 
and  he  wrote  him  a  letter,  which  Seward  took 
for  a  momentary  ebullition  of  temper,  but  which 
was  in  truth  a  declaration  of  undying  hostility. 


FORMATION    OF   THE  REPUBLICAN  PARTY.    151 

Greeley  bided  his  time ;  and  in  1860  went  from 
New  York  to  Chicago  as  a  "  delegate  from  Ore 
gon"  to  the  Republican  Convention,  that  he 
might  do  all  in  his  power  to  get  even  with 
Seward  and  defeat  his  nomination. 

The  defeat  of  the  Know-nothings  in  Virginia, 
and  their  domestic  disorders  in  Philadelphia, 
were  unmistakable  signs  of  waning  strength. 
The  auspicious  moment  for  the  formation  of 
a  new  party  in  those  states  which  had  clung 
to  their  old  organizations,  appeared  to  have 
arrived.  In  Ohio,  Pennsylvania,  Massachusetts, 
and  New  York,  Republican  conventions  were 
called  and  candidates  nominated.  To  this  move 
ment  in  New  York  Seward  gave  his  hearty 
adhesion  and  a  strong  impulse.  In  a  speech 
at  Albany  he  summed  up  the  case  for  the 
Northern  opponents  of  the  extension  of  slavery, 
by  a  most  graphic  sketch  of  the  changes  of  atti 
tude  in  the  slaveholders,  from  their  assent  to  the 
dedication  to  freedom  of  all  our  public  lands 
by  the  ordinance  of  1787,  to  their  steady  en 
croachments  and  constantly  increasing  demands 
as  to  our  newly  acquired  territory  from  the  time 
of  the  Louisiana  purchase  to  the  repeal  of  the 
Missouri  Compromise  ;  and  he  showed  the  ne 
cessity  of  a  new  party  organization  to  resist  the 
future  exactions  of  this  privileged  and  persist 
ent  class. 


152  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

The  result  of  the  autumn  elections,  however, 
indicated  that  the  Northern  seceders  from  the 
Know  -  nothing  party  had  under  -  estimated  its 
strength,  and  justified  the  boast  of  the  New 
York  leader  of  its  pro  -  slavery  faction :  that, 
though  they  had  expelled  thirty  thousand  mem 
bers  for  supporting  Seward's  reelection,  they 
could  still  muster  votes  enough  to  carry  the 
state.  The  outcome  of  these  elections,  as  a 
whole,  was  somewhat  disheartening  for  the  Re 
publicans;  the  Democracy  recovered  New  Jer 
sey,  Pennsylvania,  Indiana,  and  Illinois ;  and 
the  pro-slavery  American  party,  with  the  "  Sil 
ver  Grey  "  Whigs,  who  voted  for  its  candidates, 
carried  New  York,  California,  and  Massachu 
setts.  If  any  conclusion  is  to  be  drawn  from 
the  result  in  New  York,  it  would  seem  to  be 
that,  had  Seward  surrendered  his  own  judgment 
to  the  opinions  of  those  who  advocated  the  for 
mation  of  a  new  national  party  the  year  before, 
and  had  he  abandoned  the  Whig  organization 
at  that  time,  the  Know-nothings  or  the  Demo 
cracy  would  have  carried  the  state,  he  would 
have  returned  to  private  life,  and  the  country 
would  have  lost  his  great  services  during  the 
trying  six  years  to  come. 

The  Republican  party  having  been  organized 
in  the  various  Northern  States,  the  next  step 
was  to  give  it  a  national  character  and  prepare 


FORMATION   OF   THE  REPUBLICAN  PARTY.    153 

for  the  presidential  campaign  of  the  following 
year.  A  preliminary  matter,  to  which  much 
consideration  was  given  by  some  of  the  leading 
men,  was  the  question  of  the  recognition  of  the 
Know-nothings,  either  in  the  call  for  the  con 
vention,  the  platform,  or  the  candidates,  and  an 
alliance,  if  not  a  fusion,  of  the  two  parties. 

Just  at  the  close  of  the  year,  at  a  conference 
to  which  Seward  was  invited,  but  which  he  de 
clined  to  attend,  it  was  proposed  to  have  a 
convention,  half  Republican,  and  half  Know-no 
thing,  and  he  was  told  that  all  the  free  states 
except  New  York  either  had  acquiesced  in  it  or 
would  do  so.  Seward  declined  to  assume  any 
responsibility  as  to  the  action  of  his  state ;  but 
for  himself  protested  against  any  such  combina 
tion,  saying  that  if  it  were  carried  out,  he  should 
disavow  all  connection  or  sympathy  with  it. 
The  prospect  of  some  such  understanding  he 
thought  increasing  as  time  went  on,  and  re 
gretted  that  the  tone  of  anti-slavery  sentiment 
was  becoming  daily  more  and  more  modified 
under  the  pressure  of  Know-nothing  influence, 
feeling  as  if  he  himself  were  half  demoralized 
by  it.  The  question  had  a  personal  bearing 
with  him  from  the  outset.  He  would  have  liked 
the  presidential  nomination,  if  the  new  party 
were  to  put  itself  squarely  on  a  ground  of  prin 
ciple  and  not  of  expediency ;  but  he  could  not 


154  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

accept  it  if  there  should  be  any  taint  of  Know- 
nothingism,  either  about  the  convention  or  the 
platform.  At  the  conference  which  has  been 
spoken  of,  it  was  stated  that  Fremont  and 
Chase  were  both  candidates ;  and  it  was  also 
said  on  Weed's  authority  that  Seward  was  not 
so.  This  Seward  confirmed,  so  far  as  it  related 
to  a  nomination  by  the  joint  convention  then 
proposed ;  but  he  by  no  means  abandoned 
either  the  hope  or  the  desire  for  the  nomination, 
though  he  put  himself  as  to  that  in  Weed's 
hands,  trusting  to  his  political  sagacity  to  de 
cide  what  was  best.  The  trend  of  opinion  in 
favor  of  Fremont  was  so  strong  that  early  in 
April  Seward  wrote  that  it  had  ripened  into  the 
general  impression  that  it  would  be  expedient 
to  nominate  the  California  candidate ;  but  his 
apprehensions  of  some  arrangement  with  the 
Know-nothings  were  by  no  means  relieved.  "  I 
am  content  and  quiet  on  the  personal  question," 
he  wrote  to  Weed,  "  and  when  the  array  of  the 
battle  shall  be  set  and  fixed,  I  shall  decide  upon 
my  own  line  of  duty,  so  as  to  save  my  independ 
ence  without  the  exhibition  of  personal  suscep 
tibilities." 

A  preliminary  convention,  on  the  22d  of  Feb 
ruary,  had  announced  the  organization  of  the 
^Republicans  as  a  national  party ;  its  nominating 
convention  was  to  be  held  at  Philadelphia  on  the 


FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN  PARTY.     155 

17th  of  June.  As  this  time  drew  near  Seward's 
uneasiness  increased ;  he  thought  the  indications 
decisive  of  a  compromise  which  would  be  embar 
rassing  to  him,  and  "  even  more  injurious  to  the 
great  cause  in  whose  name  it  was  to  be  made." 
He  had  not,  however,  nor  had  the  people  gen 
erally  abandoned  all  expectation  of  his  being 
the  nominee  of  the  convention  ;  and  though  he 
learned,  —  and  with  apparent  surprise,  tracing 
no  connection  between  Greeley's  conduct  and  his 
letter,  —  that  Greeley  had  struck  hands  with  his 
enemies,  and  sacrificed  him  for  the  good  of  the 
cause,  and  that  Weed  had  concurred  in  this; 
yet  it  was  not  till  the  day  the  convention  met 
that  he  absolutely  declined  the  nomination,  upon 
the  ground  that  the  convention  was  not  pre 
pared  to  adopt  all  his  principles,  and  that  he 
would  not  modify  them  to  secure  the  presi 
dency.  Chase's  name  was  also  withdrawn,  and 
the  only  candidates  practically  before  the  con 
vention  were  Fremont  and  McLean.  The  latter 
was  the  choice  of  Pennsylvania,  the  only  man,  it 
was  said,  who  could  carry  that  state,  where  the 
Republican  party  contained  a  large  admixture  of 
Know-nothings,  to  whom  Seward  was  impossible 
and  Fremont  unacceptable.  But  on  the  first 
ballot  Fremont  received  a  decisive  majority,  and 
his  nomination  was  at  once  made  unanimous. 
The  platform,  contrary  to  Seward's  expectation, 


156  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

contained  nothing  to  which  he  could  not  cor 
dially  assent.  The  result  of  the  convention  was, 
as  he  himself  expressed  it,  "  a  complete  Seward 
platform  with  new  representative  men  upon  it." 
It  is  certainly  very  doubtful  whether,  if  Sew 
ard  himself  had  personally  urged  his  claims  for 
the  nomination  at  this  time,  and  his  friends  had 
done  all  in  their  power  to  procure  it  for  him,  he 
could  have  carried  the  convention.  He  was  not 
then  so  strong  in  the  country  as  he  was  four 
years  later  ;  in  the  Republican  party,  especially 
in  Pennsylvania  and  Indiana,  there  were  many 
seceders  from  the  Know-nothings  to  whom  he 
was  particularly  objectionable  ;  the  opposition  of 
the  delegates  from  these  states  in  the  conven 
tion  four  years  later  had  a  powerful,  if  not  a 
conclusive,  effect  against  him  at  that  time,  and 
their  influence  would  have  been  greater  in  1856 
than  it  was  in  1860.  Moreover,  his  anti-slavery 
views  were  more  advanced  than  those  of  a  large 
number  of  Republicans,  who  were  opposed  to 
the  extension  of  slavery,  but  by  no  means  be 
lievers  in  emancipation  in  the  District  of  Co 
lumbia,  or  in  taking  any  steps  towards  ulti 
mate  emancipation  in  the  slave  states,  even  with 
their  consent  and  with  compensation.  He  was 
really  in  1856  the  candidate  of  the  original 
anti-slavery  men,  the  pioneers  of  the  army  of 
freedom. 


f    \  OF   THK  ^ 

I  UNIVERSITY  I 

^-    v 

VgfcA'  !FOH^>^ 
FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN  PARTY.     157 

Two  years  earlier  Seward  had  objected  to  a 
national  convention,  on  the  ground  "that  it 
would  bring  together  only  the  old  veterans." 
Now  the  ranks  of  the  anti-Nebraska  party  were 
filled  with  new  recruits,  young  men  ;  they  were 
the  bone  and  sinew  of  the  party  in  the  country, 
and  the  delegates  at  Philadelphia  represented 
them.  Fremont  was  their  choice.  All  that  was 
known  of  him,  his  pluck,  energy,  persistent  en 
durance,  and  skill  as  an  explorer,  justified  their 
attributing  to  him  the  qualities  which  the  times 
and  the  triumph  of  the  Republicans  would  re 
quire.  His  career  appealed  to  them  ;  his  adven 
tures  roused  their  interest  and  excited  their  ad 
miration  ;  there  was  a  romance  about  his  mar 
riage  which  touched  their  sympathies,  and  there 
had  been  an  element  of  martyrdom  in  his  treat 
ment  by  the  government  which  enlisted  in  his 
behalf  the  lovers  of  justice.  He  was  person 
ally  handsome  and  attractive  ;  a  Southerner  by 
birth,  and  a  son-in-law  of  Benton,  who,  as  an 
opponent  —  though  on  grounds  peculiar  to  him 
self  —  of  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compro 
mise,  had  more  or  less  close  relations  with  the 
Republican  leaders.  Everything  told  in  his 
favor.  To  those  delegates  who  were  looking 
only  to  the  promotion  of  the  principles  of  their 
party,  as  well  as  to  those  who  were  eager  for 
success,  and  to  the  mass  of  the  people,  Fremont 


158  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

appeared  an  ideal  candidate.  He  was  invested 
by  them  with  the  qualities  of  a  hero ;  and  of  all 
the  names  presented  to  the  convention,  or  sug 
gested  elsewhere,  his  was  doubtless  the  most 
potent  to  conjure  with. 

The  nomination  of  Buchanan  was  the  strong 
est  that  the  Democrats  could  have  made,  and 
was  discouraging  to  the  Republicans.  "  The  tem 
per  of  the  politicians  "  (i.  e.  the  Republican), 
wrote  Seward,  "  is  subdued  by  Buchanan's  nomi 
nation,  and  indicates  retreat,  confusion,  rout  in 
the  election."  Early  in  August  he  found  that 
"  there  was  no  Republican  organization  or  life 
in  eastern  Pennsylvania  or  New  Jersey,"  and 
that  "  the  well-informed  despaired  of  both  these 
states,  and  so  of  the  election  itself."  There 
was  a  pressure  on  him  to  take  the  field ;  never 
theless,  he  did  not  make  any  campaign  speech 
till  October.  Congress  was  late  in  adjourning. 
The  two  houses  disagreed  as  to  the  army  ap 
propriations,  —  the  Representatives  passed  the 
bill  with  a  proviso,  prohibiting  the  employment 
of  troops  to  enforce  the  laws  of  the  fraudulent 
legislature  of  Kansas ;  the  Senate  refused  to 
concur ;  and  so  the  session  ended.  The  Presi 
dent  immediately  called  an  extra  session,  and, 
after  laboring  ten  days  with  the  recalcitrant 
Democrats,  succeeded  in  forcing  through  the 
House,  by  the  narrow  majority  of  three,  the  bill 


FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN  PARTY.     159 

without  the  proviso.  Seward  took  a  month's 
needed  rest,  then  spoke  at  Detroit,  and  de 
voted  the  time  till  the  election  to  the  work  of 
the  campaign  at  various  and  widely  separated 
places  in  his  own  state.  Of  these  speeches  only 
two  have  been  preserved  in  any  permanent 
form.  In  that  at  Detroit  he  drew  a  vivid  pic 
ture,  hardly  exaggerated,  of  the  slaveholders' 
entire  possession  of  the  government  in  all  its 
branches  :  —  the  executive,  from  the  President 
and  the  heads  of  the  various  departments  to  the 
humblest  tide-waiter  in  the  Customs,  the  most 
unimportant  consul  in  our  foreign  service,  and 
the  merest  scrivener  in  the  army  of  clerks ;  the 
legislative,  through  their  control  of  the  Senate, 
with  the  aid  of  their  Northern  Democratic  allies ; 
and  the  judicial,  by  having  a  majority  of  the 
justices  of  the  Supreme  Court  from  the  slave- 
holding  states.  He  also  showed  how  fidelity  to 
the  slaveholders'  policy  was  the  test  required  of 
all  Northern  Democrats  who  wished  to  share 
even  the  crumbs  that  fell  from  the  government's 
table. 

His  speech  at  Auburn  repeated  his  opinion 
that  the  conflict  was  not  merely  for  "  toleration, 
but  for  absolute  political  sway  in  the  Republic, 
between  the  system  of  free  labor  with  equal  and 
universal  suffrage,  free  speech,  free  thought,  and 
free  action,  and  the  system  of  slave  labor  with 


160  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

unequal  franchises,  secured  by  arbitrary,  oppres 
sive,  and  tyrannical  laws ; "  and  emphasized  again 
his  conviction  that  "  the  state,  the  nation  and  the 
earth  were  to  be,  in  the  fullness  of  time,  the 
abode  of  freemen,  and  its  hills  and  valleys  to  be 
fields  of  free  labor,  free  thought  and  free  suf 
frage." 

New  York  responded  handsomely  to  Seward's 
arguments  and  appeals  ;  though  Fremont  carried 
the  state  only  by  a  plurality,  he  had  eighty 
thousand  votes  more  than  Buchanan,  and  his 
majority  over  Fillmore  was  greater  than  Fill- 
more's  entire  vote.  Of  the  sixteen  free  states, 
eleven  voted  for  Fremont.  He  received  only 
twelve  hundred  votes  in  the  slave  states,  and 
these  came  from  Delaware,  Maryland,  Virginia, 
and  Kentucky.  Buchanan  was  elected  by  the 
solid  South,  with  the  aid  of  five  free  states 
(New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  Indiana,  Illinois, 
and  California).  In  the  free  states  Buchanan 
had  a  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  less  votes 
than  Fremont,  and  by  the  popular  vote  of  the 
country  was  in  a  minority  of  nearly  three  hun 
dred  thousand.  There  were  votes  for  Fillmore 
in  all  the  states  where  the  people  chose  the 
electors ; 1  but  they  were  so  distributed  that 
though  he  was  the  choice  of  nearly  nine  hundred 

1  In  South  Carolina  they  were  chosen  by  the  Legislature. 


FORMATION   OF   THE   REPUBLICAN  PARTY.     161 

thousand  voters,  he  received  only  the  eight  elec 
toral  votes  of  the  state  of  Maryland. 

The  elections  of  the  year  had  an  ominous 
aspect.  In  the  House  of  Representatives  the 
speaker  was  chosen  for  the  first  time  by  a  purely 
sectional  majority,  no  Southern  man  voting  for 
the  successful  candidate,  and  no  Northerner  for 
his  opponent.  The  issue  in  the  presidential 
campaign  had  been  solely  sectional,  —  the  surren 
der  of  the  territories  to  slavery  or  its  exclusion 
from  them.  Buchanan,  though  a  Pennsylvanian, 
was  the  nominee  of  the  South,  and  the  repre 
sentative  of  the  slaveholders'  policy.  The  new 
party  had  carried  nearly  three  fourths  of  the 
free  states,  had  given  to  Douglas,  as  a  colleague, 
an  anti-Nebraska  senator,  and  substituted  for 
General  Cass  a  radical  Republican  from  Michi 
gan.  If  the  South  had  won  the  victory,  it  was 
one  that  boded  ill  for  their  future  control  of 
the  country. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS. 

AFTER  the  passage  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
bill,  the  political  struggle  during  the  remainder 
of  Pierce' s  term  and  for  a  large  part  of  Bu 
chanan's  was  as  to  slavery  or  freedom  in  Kansas. 
On  the  one  side  were  arrayed  the  administration 
with  its  patronage  and  appointments,  the  solid 
South,  with  its  members  of  Congress,  its  Demo 
cratic  supporters  in  the  North  and  the  border 
ruffians  from  Missouri ;  on  the  other  were  the 
free  state  settlers  in  Kansas,  who  were  largely 
in  the  majority  there,  and  the  Republican  party 
in  Congress  and  in  the  country.  The  battle  was 
fought  in  the  territory  between  the  settlers  and 
immigrants  from  the  North,  and  the  invaders 
from  Missouri  and  the  South  ;  in  Washington, 
by  the  President  and  his  advisers  at  the  White 
House,  by  senators  and  representatives  at  the 
Capitol.  But  as  the  members  of  the  lower  house 
are  more  numerous  and  more  frequently  elected, 
the  change  in  the  public  opinion  of  the  North 
caused  by  the  passage  of  the  bill  was  more 
quickly  shown  there,  the  opposition  to  the  ad- 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS.      163 

ministration  was  stronger  in  the  House,  and  the 
part  played  by  the  representatives  during  the 
struggle  was  in  some  respects  more  prominent 
and  important  than  that  of  the  Senate,  with 
which  Seward  was  directly  concerned.  The 
story  of  the  struggle  cannot,  however,  be  omit 
ted  here,  nor  can  any  one  part  of  it  be  told  with 
out  the  other. 

The  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  had 
thoroughly  roused  all  the  Northern  people  except 
the  Hunker  Democrats.  Angry  at  the  South's 
breach  of  faith  in  accepting  the  benefits  of  a  bar 
gain  and  then  repudiating  its  obligations,  the 
North  determined  to  save  for  freedom,  if  possi 
ble,  the  territory  secured  by  the  Compromise. 
The  South  recognized  the  struggle  as  a  vital  one. 
"If  Kansas  is  abolitionized,"  wrote  Atchison, 
"  Missouri  ceases  to  be  a  slave  state,  New  Mexico 
becomes  a  free  state,  California  remains  a  free 
state.  But  if  we  secure  Kansas  as  a  slave  state, 
Missouri  is  secure,  New  Mexico,  and  southern 
California,  if  not  all  of  it,  becomes  a  slave  state  ; 
in  a  word,  the  prosperity  or  ruin  of  the  whole 
South  depends  on  the  Kansas  struggle." 

One  or  more  emigrant  aid  societies  had  been 
organized  at  the  North  before  the  passage  of  the 
bill,  and  others  followed  afterwards.  Among 
the  earliest  was  the  New  England  Emigrant  Aid 
Society,  a  Massachusetts  company,  which  assisted 


164  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

five  hundred  free  state  men  to  emigrate  and 
settle  in  Kansas  within  a  year,  and  about  three 
thousand  during  the  entire  struggle.  The  ad 
ministration  was  prompt  in  opening  the  territory 
to  settlement,  and  had  purchased,  while  the  bill 
was  still  pending,  several  Eeservations  lying 
nearest  Missouri,  from  the  Indian  tribes  to 
whom  they  had  been  secured  by  treaty.  These 
purchases  were  known  to  the  people  of  Missouri 
before  the  rest  of  the  country  had  learned  of 
them  ;  and,  within  a  few  days  after  the  bill  be 
came  a  law,  hundreds  of  Missourians  entered 
the  territory  in  small  bodies  at  various  points, 
staked  out,  each  man  for  himself,  his  quarter 
section  or  more,  and  marked  it.  The  different 
companies  then  held  meetings,  at  which  they 
resolved  that  slavery  already  existed  in  the  terri 
tory,  and  urged  slaveholders  to  bring  in  their 
property  at  once  ;  while  they  also  voted  to  afford 
no  protection  to  abolitionist  settlers.  To  offset 
the  emigrant  aid  societies  of  the  North,  associ 
ations  called  "Blue  Lodges,"  "Sons  of  the 
South,"  and  other  similar  names,  were  organized 
in  western  Missouri,  to  take  possession  of  Kan 
sas  in  behalf  of  slavery,  and  to  assist  in  removing 
any  emigrant  who  might  go  there  under  the 
auspices  of  the  Northern  societies. 

The    first  territorial   governor  appointed  by 
President   Pierce   was  Andrew  H.    Reeder,  of 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS.      165 

Pennsylvania,  whose  loyalty  as  an  administra 
tion  Democrat  was  unquestioned.  An  election 
for  a  delegate  to  Congress  was  had  by  his  orders 
at  the  end  of  November,  1854,  and  of  the  twenty- 
eight  hundred  ballots  then  cast,  more  than  seven 
teen  hundred  were  the  illegal  votes  of  invading 
Missourians.  In  one  polling  precinct  six  hun 
dred  and  four  votes  were  thrown,  of  which  only 
twenty  were  legal.  There  was  no  concealment 
about  the  matter ;  what  was  done  was  done 
openly,  and  was  encouraged  and  approved. 
"  When  you  reside  within  one  day's  journey  of 
the  territory,"  said  Senator  Atchison  in  a  public 
speech  before  this  election,  "and  when  your 
peace,  your  quiet  and  your  property  depend 
upon  your  action,  you  can,  without  any  exertion, 
send  five  hundred  of  your  young  men  who  will 
vote  in  favor  of  your  institutions.  Should  each 
county  in  Missouri  only  do  its  duty,  the  question 
will  be  decided  quietly  and  peaceably  at  the 
ballot  box." 

After  ascertaining  by  a  census  the  number  of 
legal  voters  in  the  territory,  Governor  Reeder 
appointed  a  day  for  the  election  of  a  territorial 
legislature.  The  evening  before,  about  a  thou 
sand  Missourians,  armed  with  rifles,  pistols,  and 
bowie-knives,  and  supported  by  two  pieces  of 
artillery,  arrived  at  Lawrence,  a  free  state  town. 
They  distributed  their  men  among  the  different 


166  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

election  precincts,  overawed  the  judges  of  elec 
tion,  and,  reenforced  by  other  men  of  Missouri, 
chose  their  candidates  in  all  but  two  of  the  dis 
tricts.  The  census  had  shown  twenty-nine  hun 
dred  voters  ;  but  more  than  six  thousand  ballots 
were  cast,  only  eight  hundred  of  which  were  legal. 
In  some  of  the  districts,  where  protests  were  sea 
sonably  made,  the  governor  declined  to  issue 
certificates  of  election,  and  ordered  a  new  poll ; 
but  the  legislature  refused  to  admit  the  free 
state  men  chosen  on  this  second  ballot,  and  gave 
the  seats  to  the  persons  to  whom  the  governor 
had  refused  certificates.  The  legislature  thus 
chosen  adopted  by  a  single  act  all  the  Missouri 
statutes  (to  save  time),  and  then  proceeded  to 
pass,  notwithstanding  the  governor's  veto,  a 
criminal  code,  by  which  nearly  all  offenses  con 
nected  with  slavery,  including  that  of  aiding  a 
fugitive  to  escape,  were  made  punishable  with 
death. 

Reeder's  course  as  to  the  election  and  his 
vetoes  made  it  clear  that  he  was  riot  a  sufficiently 
pliant  tool ;  the  President,  yielding  to  the  pres 
sure  from  the  South,  removed  him,  and  ap 
pointed  in  his  place  Wilson  Shannon  of  Ohio, 
who  signalized  his  arrival  in  the  territory  by 
declaring  in  a  public  speech  that  he  was  "  for 
slavery  in  Kansas."  Isolated  acts  of  violence 
had  taken  place  from  time  to  time,  before  and 


THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.  167 

during  Reeder's  administration ;  a  free  state 
settler  had  been  occasionally  murdered ;  the 
pro-slavery  newspapers  had  given  warning  that 
they  "  would  continue  to  lynch  and  hang,  tar, 
feather,  and  drown  every  white-livered  abolition 
ist  who  dared  to  pollute  the  soil ;  "  and  Law 
rence  had  been  threatened  by  a  party  of  more 
than  two  hundred  Missourians.  Under  Shan 
non's  misgovernment  such  outrages  became  the 
rule ;  Lawrence  was  plundered ;  its  printing 
offices  and  hotels  were  burned  by  a  troop  oft 
about  eight  hundred  men,  partly  from  the  South 
and  partly  from  Missouri,  armed  with  weapons 
from  the  United  States  arsenal,  and  commanded 
by  General  Atchison,  United  States  senator  from 
Missouri ;  whilst  later  the  town  of  Osawatomie 
was  sacked  and  burned  by  a  similar  force  headed 
by  Whitfield,  the  territorial  delegate  to  Con 
gress. 

Meantime,  the  free  state  settlers,  seeking  re 
lief  by  a  thoroughly  American  process,  had 
called  a  convention,  which  framed  a  constitution 
prohibiting  slavery.  This  was  ratified  by  the 
actual  settlers,  a  governor  and  legislature  were 
chosen,  and  a  memorial  was  forwarded  to  Con 
gress  praying  for  the  admission  of  Kansas  as  a 
free  state  under  this  constitution.  The  Presi 
dent's  annual  message,  sent  in  on  the  last  day  of 
the  year  (1855),  dismissed  the  subject  of  Kansas 


168  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

with  a  word ;  but  less  than  a  month  later,  when 
he  had  determined  to  give  a  thorough-going 
support  to  the  Southerners,  although  nothing 
new  had  happened  in  the  interval,  he  sent  a 
special  message  in  which  he  characterized  the 
proceedings  of  the  free  state  settlers  as  revolu 
tionary  and  treasonable,1  and  announced  his 
purpose  of  upholding  the  fraudulent  legislature 
and  enforcing  its  laws  by  Federal  authority ; 
and,  in  accordance  with  the  policy  thus  declared, 
the  legislature  at  Topeka  was  dispersed  by 
United  States  regulars  in  the  following  July. 

A  guerrilla  war  was  carried  on  during  the  sum 
mer  of  the  year  1856  between  bands  of  free 
state  and  pro-slavery  men.  In  August  the  ad 
ministration,  unable  longer  to  endure  the  scan 
dals  of  Shannon's  misgovernment,  and  fearing 
lest  these  should  lose  them  the  presidential 
election,  removed  him,  and  appointed  John  W. 
Geary  of  Pennsylvania  in  his  place.  Geary 
endeavored  to  restore  order  and  to  do  exact 
justice,  leaning  neither  to  one  side  nor  the 

1  It  was  nothing1  revolutionary  or  even  unprecedented  for 
the  people  of  a  territory,  without  any  previous  authority  from 
Congress,  to  form  a  state  constitution  and  ask  for  admission 
to  the  Union.  Michigan  did  this  and  was  admitted ;  Califor 
nia  had  done  it  and  been  admitted  ;  and  the  reasons  for  the 
action  of  the  people  of  Kansas,  though  of  a  different  nature, 
were  quite  as  strong  as  those  which  existed  in  either  Cali 
fornia  or  Michigan. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS.     169 

other  ;  but,  finding  that  this  impartiality  was  not 
what  the  administration  required,  he  resigned 
in  the  following  March. 

Whatever  may  have  been  President  Pierce's 
ideas,  when  he  assented  to  Douglas's  bill  and 
accepted  the  doctrine  of  popular  sovereignty,  in 
his  actual  treatment  of  Kansas  he  had  been  not 
the  honest  exponent  of  that  policy,  but  the  active 
and  unhesitating  agent  of  those  Southerners 
who  were  determined,  by  fair  means  or  foul,  to 
make  that  territory  a  slave  state.  He  finds  his 
severest  condemnation  in  the  course  of  the 
governors  appointed  by  him.  The  two  who 
were  men  of  character,  and  who  were  not  willing 
to  use  their  power  to  defeat  the  wishes  of  the 
actual  settlers  and  to  drive  the  free  state  men 
from  the  territory,  were  forced  out  of  office,  and 
became  most  active  opponents  of  his  policy,  un 
sparing  in  their  exposures  and  denunciations  of 
the  frauds  and  violence  which  he  was  seeking  to 
hide  ;  while  the  third,  who  had  been  at  first 
the  ready  tool  of  the  border  ruffians  of  Missouri, 
and  acceptable  to  the  whole  South,  was  at  last 
unable  to  satisfy  their  demands,  was  distrusted 
by  them,  despised  by  the  other  party,  and  re 
moved  in  disgrace  by  the  administration  that  had 
appointed  him. 

In  the  Congress  which  met  in  December, 
1855,  the  House  had  a  majority  hostile  to  the 


170  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD, 

administration,  but  composed  of  heterogeneous 
elements.  There  were  Democrats  and  pro- 
slavery  Whigs,  both  pro-slavery  and  anti-slavery 
Americans,  and  Republicans.  No  one  party 
had  the  control,  and  it  was  not  until  the  3d  of 
February,  1856,  that  its  organization  was  per 
fected  by  the  choice  of  a  speaker.  Meantime, 
both  houses  had  taken  action  on  the  Kansas 
question,  the  Senate  by  resolutions  of  inquiry, 
calling  on  the  President  for  information  as  to 
the  troubles  there  ;  and  the  House  by  the  pass 
age  of  a  resolve  demanding  the  restoration  of 
the  Missouri  Compromise.  In  the  Senate,  the 
President's  special  message  concerning  Kansas, 
and  his  answer  to  the  resolutions  of  inquiry, 
were  referred  to  the  committee  on  Territories,  of 
which  Douglas  was  chairman.  The  committee 
presented  two  reports  ;  that  of  the  majority,  pre 
pared  by  Douglas,  was  very  severe  upon  the 
settlers  from  the  free  states  and  upon  the 
Emigrant  Aid  Society,  who  were  made  respon 
sible  for  all  that  was  wrong  in  Kansas  ;  while  the 
fraudulent  legislature,  he  insisted,  was  a  proper 
law-making  body,  whose  acts  were  legal  statutes 
binding  upon  the  people.  The  minority  report 
was  signed  only  by  Senator  Collamer  of  Ver 
mont,  who  justified  the  Topeka  convention  and 
the  proceedings  under  it  as  a  peaceful  and  con 
stitutional  effort  for  the  redress  of  grievances. 


THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.  171 

The  Emigrant  Aid  Society  was  vindicated  from 
Douglas's  attack,  as  soon  as  the  reading  of  the 
reports  was  finished,  by  Simmer's  spirited  pro 
test  that  it  had  not  offended,  either  in  letter  or 
spirit,  the  Constitution  and  laws  of  the  land. 
It  had  sent  men  to  Kansas,  "  and  it  had  a  right 
to  do  so.  Its  agents  loved  freedom  and  hated 
slavery,  and  they  had  a  right  to  do  so."  "  This, 
and  no  more,  was  its  offense." 

In  the  House  Governor  Reeder,  who  had 
been  elected  by  the  legal  voters  of  Kansas  as 
territorial  delegate,  presented  a  petition  claim 
ing  the  seat  held  by  Whitfield,  the  delegate 
fraudulently  chosen  by  the  Missourians ;  and 
this  petition,  after  some  debate,  was  referred  to 
a  committee  empowered  to  investigate  generally 
the  Kansas  troubles.  The  exhaustive  report 
of  this  committee,  with  the  accompanying  evi 
dence,  is  a  storehouse  of  information  as  to  the 
history  of  the  times.  On  the  same  day  that 
this  committee  was  appointed  in  the  House, 
Douglas  addressed  the  Senate  in  support  of  his 
report  and  of  the  bill  in  which  its  conclusions 
were  embodied,  which  authorized  the  people  of 
Kansas  to  form  a  state  constitution,  when  they 
should  have  sufficient  population  to  entitle  them 
to  one  representative  in  Congress.  For  this 
bill  Seward  proposed,  as  a  substitute,  the  im 
mediate  admission  of  Kansas  under  the  Topeka 


172  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

constitution.  Of  his  speech  in  support  of  this 
substitute,  one  hundred  and  sixty-two  thousand 
copies  were  sent  out  on  the  day  it  was  published. 
Such  defense  as  could  be  made  for  the  invad 
ers  of  Kansas,  for  the  rule  they  had  established 
there,  and  for  the  government's  support  of  it, 
had  already  been  set  forth  in  the  President's 
message  and  in  Douglas's  report ;  and  a  large 
part  of  Seward's  speech  was  devoted  to  a  scath 
ing  criticism  of  the  President's  message,  and  an 
unsparing  exposure  of  his  misrepresentations 
and  concealment  of  facts,  of  his  unjust  asper 
sions  on  the  North,  and  of  the  flimsy  pretexts 
and  hardly  specious  arguments  by  which  he  at 
tempted  to  justify  his  course.  It  might  almost 
be  called,  in  this  aspect,  an  arraignment,  trial 
and  conviction  of  the  President,  upon  the  charge 
of  prostituting  his  official  power  to  sustain  in 
Kansas  a  government  which  he  knew,  from  his 
own  representatives,  had  been  forced  upon  the 
territory  by  the  frauds  and  violence  of  the 
people  of  Missouri.  Seward  proved  to  a  demon 
stration,  by  the  declarations  of  the  leaders  of 
the  border  ruffians,  by  the  statements  of  inde 
pendent  observers,  as  well  as  by  those  of  the 
free  settlers  of  Kansas,  and  the  public  avowals 
of  the  territorial  governor,  whom  the  President 
himself  had  appointed,  that  "  Kansas  had  been 
invaded,  conquered,  subjugated  by  an  armed 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS.      173 

force  from  beyond  her  borders,  trampling  under 
foot  the  principles  of  the  Kansas  bill  and  the 
rights  of  suffrage ; "  and  that  the  President  of 
the  United  States  was  aiding  and  abetting  this 
wrong,  upholding  with  all  the  resources  of  the 
administration  and  all  the  powers  of  the  Fed 
eral  authority  the  perpetrators  of  this  outrage 
upon  republican  government,  and  maintaining 
by  force  of  arms  the  tyranny  they  had  estab 
lished.  Seward  then  turned  to  the  question  of 
how  these  wrongs  were  to  be  redressed.  His 
contention  was  unanswerable,  that  the  only  sure 
remedy  was  the  immediate  admission  of  Kansas 
as  a  state,  under  the  constitution  presented  by 
the  actual  settlers.  The  objections  urged  to 
this  course  were  practically  only  formal,  and 
might  be  waived  by  Congress  in  this  case,  as 
they  had  been  in  others.  Touching  the  very 
heart  of  the  controversy,  he  said  :  "  Congress 
can  refuse  admission  to  Kansas  only  on  the 
ground  that  it  will  not  relinquish  the  hope  of 
carrying  African  slavery  into  that  territory," 
.  .  .  and  asked :  "  Have  we  come  to  that  stage 
of  demoralization  and  degeneracy  so  soon  ?  " 

The  speech  was  the  masterly  argument  of  a 
statesman.  If  he  sometimes  showed  a  fondness 
for  philosophical  generalization  and  theorizing, 
there  was  nothing  of  that  here  ;  it  was  an  emi 
nently  practical  speech.  Any  remedy,  other 


174  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

than  that  which  he  urged,  was  at  the  best  doubt 
ful.  Any  plan  authorizing  the  calling  of  a  new 
convention,  and  the  formation  of  a  new  consti 
tution,  because  of  defects  or  uncertainties  about 
the  one  adopted  at  Topeka,  must  be  carried  out 
by  the  authorities  actually  in  power  in  Kansas, 
the  creatures  and  tools  of  the  border  ruffians 
who  elected  them,  and  under  the  supervision  of 
an  administration  whose  partisan  character  and 
absolute  disregard  of  justice  and  of  the  pledges 
of  the  organic  law  of  the  territory  had  already 
been  abundantly  manifested.  But  the  truth 
was,  as  Seward  suggested,  that  neither  the  ad 
ministration  nor  the  South  was  prepared  to 
relinquish  one  inch  of  the  advantage  which 
slavery  had  already  gained  in  the  territory, 
whether  acquired  by  force  or  fraud ;  both  were 
still  confidently  expecting  to  make  it  a  slave 
state  ;  and  the  majority  of  the  Senate  were  sup 
porters  of  the  South  and  of  the  administra 
tion. 

The  debate  on  Kansas  continued  till  the  close 
of  the  session  in  August ;  it  resulted  in  no 
legislation ;  but  the  speeches  of  the  opposition, 
circulated  by  hundreds  of  thousands  all  over  the 
North,  had  an  immense  effect  in  forming  and 
stimulating  public  opinion,  and  produced  a  re 
action  even  in  Congress.  This  was  increased  by 
the  assault  upon  Sumner  in  the  Senate  chamber 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS.      175 

itself,  by  the  burning  of  Lawrence,  and  by  the 
publication  of  the  report  of  the  committee  of 
the  House,  charged  to  investigate  the  Kansas 
troubles. 

For  two  whole  days  Sumner  addressed  the 
Senate  in  denunciation  of  the  crime  against 
Kansas.  His  speech  was  not  merely  an  unspar 
ing  philippic  against  slavery,  but  most  bitter  in 
its  personalities.  He  spoke  of  Atchison,  stalk 
ing  like  Catiline  into  the  Senate,  reeking  with 
conspiracy,  and  then  like  Catiline  skulking  away 
to  join  and  provoke  the  conspirators,  "  murder 
ous  robbers  from  Missouri,  hirelings,  picked 
from  the  drunken  spew  and  vomit  of  an  uneasy 
civilization ;  "  of  Butler  of  South  Carolina, 
"  with  incoherent  phrases,  discharging  the  loose 
expectoration  of  his  speech;"  and  of  Douglas, 
as  "  switching  out  from  his  tongue  the  perpetual 
stench  of  offensive  personality."  It  was  a 
speech  in  this  aspect  to  make  the  judicious 
grieve,  and  feel  a  keen  regret  that  Sumner 
should  have  descended  to  such  a  level.  It  would 
hardly  have  gained  converts  to  the  Republican 
party  but  for  the  assault  by  which  it  was  fol 
lowed. 

Two  days  later,  while  he  was  writing  at  his 
desk  in  the  Senate  chamber,  just  after  the 
adjournment,  he  was  attacked  in  a  most  brutal 
and  cowardly  manner  by  Preston  S.  Brooks,  a 


176  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

member  of  the  House  from  South  Carolina,  who 
inflicted  on  him  injuries  from  which  he  never 
wholly  recovered.  The  Senate,  when  Seward 
moved  for  a  committee  to  investigate  this  assault, 
so  far  forgot  the  common  parliamentary  courte"- 
sies,  the  requirements  of  decency  and  the  gravity 
of  the  occasion,  as  to  choose  a  committee  com 
posed  wholly  of  Sumner's  personal  and  political 
enemies,  who  performed  the  service  expected  of 
them,  and  reported  that  there  was  nothing  for 
the  Senate  to  do.  The  subservient  judiciary  of 
Washington  disgraced  itself  by  inflicting  on 
Brooks  a  paltry  fine,  and  even  in  the  House  of 
Representatives  there  were  not  to  be  found  the 
necessary  two  thirds  to  secure  his  expulsion. 
Any  difference  of  opinion  there  may  have  been 
at  the  North  as  to  the  wisdom  or  good  taste  of 
Sumner's  speech  disappeared  at  once,  swallowed 
up  in  the  universal  outburst  of  sympathy  for  him 
and  indignation  at  the  assault ;  the  recollection 
of  which,  even  to-day,  heightens  Sumner's  fame, 
by  investing  him  with  somewhat  of  the  glory  of 
martyrdom. 

"  The  blows  that  fell  on  the  head  of  the  sen 
ator  from  Massachusetts,"  said  Seward,  uhave 
done  more  for  the  cause  of  human  freedom  in 
Kansas  and  in  the  territories  of  the  United 
States,  than  all  the  eloquence  which  has  re 
sounded  in  these  halls,  from  the  days  when 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS.     177 

Rufus  King  asserted  that  cause  in  this  chamber 
until  the  present  hour."  It  was  not  regarded 
merely  as  an  attack  upon  an  individual,  it  was  an 
assault  on  the  freedom  of  debate,  a  violation  of 
the  privileges  and  dignity  of  the  Senate,  an 
insult  to  the  state  that  Sumner  represented, 
and  through  that  to  all  the  other  states  of  the 

O 

Union. 

The  same  day  that  Sumner  was  speaking  in 
the  Senate,  the  free  settlers'  town  of  Lawrence 
in  Kansas  was  attacked  and  burned.  A  little 
later  came  the  report  of  the  House  committee, 
accompanied  by  evidence  which  proved,  beyond 
question,  that  the  territorial  elections  were  car 
ried  by  fraud,  the  legislature  unlawfully  consti 
tuted,  and  its  acts  without  a  color  of  legality. 
Under  these  circumstances  it  was  felt  by  some 
Southern  senators  that  there  must  be  further 
concessions  to  the  public  opinion  of  the  North, 
some  fresh  attempt  at  a  settlement  of  the  Kansas 
question.  Various  amendments  to  Douglas's 
original  bill  were  proposed,  and  other  measures 
introduced  ;  these  were  all  referred  to  the  com 
mittee  on  Territories,  who  reported  a  bill  which 
was,  in  substance,  one  that  had  been  offered  a 
few  days  before  by  Senator  Toombs  of  Georgia. 
Upon  its  face  it  was  a  fair  proposition.  There 
was  to  be  a  new  census  in  Kansas,  only  actual 
male  inhabitants  of  full  age  were  to  be  registered 


178  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

as  voters,  and  they  were  to  elect  delegates  to  a 
constitutional  convention.  Commissioners  were 
to  supervise  the  census  and  the  registration  ;  and 
frauds  and  irregularities  at  the  election  were  to 
be  prevented.  Had  the  measure  been  proposed 
in  January  instead  of  July,  its  details  might 
have  been  modified,  where  they  were  open  to 
criticism,  and  the  bill  have  become  a  law  ;  but 
it  was  brought  in  too  late.  The  presidential 
election  was  approaching,  and  Seward  thought, 
and  doubtless  others  with  him,  that  the  change 
from  denunciation  to  compromise  proceeded  only 
from  the  alarm  of  the  Democrats. 

The  Eepublicans  objected  to  the  bill  as  a  snare 
and  a  delusion.  It  did  not  directly  annul  the 
enactments  of  the  usurping  legislature.  On  the 
contrary  it  recognized  that  body  as  a  regularly 
chosen  law-making  assemblage,  and  left  it  un 
certain  whether  any  of  its  so-called  laws  were 
abrogated,  remitting  the  determination  of  this 
question  to  the  territorial  judges,  whose  partisan 
character  had  been  already  abundantly  demon 
strated.  The  proposed  bill  continued  the  exist 
ing  regime  in  Kansas,  until  a  new  census  should 
be  had,  delegates  elected,  a  convention  held,  a 
constitution  formed,  and  Kansas  admitted  as  a 
state,  thus  perpetuating  the  tyranny  established 
by  fraud  and  violence,  and  only  maintained  in 
power  by  the  arms  of  the  United  States.  It 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS.      179 

provided  that  a  census  should  be  taken  and  an 
election  held  under  the  direction  of  commission 
ers  to  be  appointed  by  a  president,  who  had 
already  shown  by  the  appointments  he  had  made, 
by  the  officers  he  had  retained,  and  by  those  he 
had  removed,  how  unevenly  he  held  the  scales 
of  justice  in  the  territory,  how  little  freedom  of 
action  he  was  allowed  by  his  masters,  and  how 
he  lacked  courage  to  assert  himself  against  the 
hot-headed  Southerners  who  prescribed  his  policy 
and  his  conduct.  All  this  and  more,  which  made 
it  "  a  sham,  evasive  Kansas  bill,"  Seward  showed 
in  his  speech  on  an  amendment,  offered  by  Wil 
son,  proposing  the  immediate  repeal  of  all  the 
spurious  laws  of  the  so-called  legislature,  —  an 
amendment  which  the  Southern  and  Democratic 
majority  of  the  Senate  at  once  rejected. 

The  proofs  of  the  wrongs  done  in  Kansas 
were  quite  different  now  from  what  they  had 
been  when  Seward  spoke  in  March.  There  was 
no  more  need  of  argument  or  inference,  and  no 
room  for  denial  or  doubt.  The  evidence  taken  by 
the  House  committee  established  conclusively 
not  only  the  public  wrong  committed  by  the 
invaders  from  Missouri  and  ratified  and  sus 
tained  by  the  President  of  the  United  States 
and  his  territorial  officers,  but  also  the  private 
violence  and  crime  by  which  settlers  from  the 
free  states  had  been  robbed  of  their  property, 


180  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

their  houses  burned,  their  cattle  destroyed  and 
they  themselves  either  murdered  or  compelled 
to  flee  for  their  lives;  and  it  was  not  to  be 
expected  that  the  Republicans  would  accept  as 
satisfactory  a  bill  which  converted  the  illegal 
oppressors  of  the  territory  into  its  rightful  gov 
ernors,  and  substituted  for  the  election  guaran 
teed  by  its  organic  law  a  ballot  to  be  taken 
after  the  settlers  from  the  free  states  had  been 
driven  from  Kansas,  and  under  conditions  which 
would  permit  the  people  from  Missouri  to  come 
into  the  territory,  according  to  their  avowed 
plan,  "  in  time  to  acquire  the  right  to  become 
legal  voters  for  the  purpose  of  determining  the 
domestic  institutions  of  the  new  state." 

The  bill  passed  the  Senate,  but  not  the  House. 
The  House  bill,  admitting  Kansas  as  a  state, 
under  the  Topeka  constitution,  was  rejected  in 
the  Senate,  and  Congress  adjourned  without 
giving  any  relief  to  the  people. 


CHAPTER  X. 

THE    DEED    SCOTT    CASE.  —  THE    FINAL    STRUG 
GLE   FOR   KANSAS.  # 

THE  closing  session  of  the  Congress  which 
expired  with  Pierce's  administration  was,  like 
most  of  the  short  sessions  ending  with  a  presi 
dential  term,  absolutely  colorless  and  unimpor 
tant  ;  and  Buchanan  was  inaugurated  with  the 
hopes  of  many  Northern  Whigs  and  Democrats, 
who  had  voted  for  him  with  hesitation,  that  he 
would  have  a  just  and  tranquil  administration, 
a  reign  of  law  and  order  in  Kansas,  and  no 
further  slavery  agitation.  But  two  days  had 
not  elapsed  before  the  country  was  shaken  to  its 
centre  by  the  extraordinary  intervention  of  the 
Supreme  Court  in  the  slavery  discussion.  The 
statement  in  Buchanan's  inaugural,  that  "the 
point  of  time  when  the  people  of  a  territory  can 
decide  the  question  of  slavery  for  themselves  " 
would  be  "speedily  and  finally  settled  by  that 
court,"  had  not  at  all  prepared  the  public  for 
what  was  to  follow.  It  was  known  that  a  case 
was  pending  before  the  Supreme  Court,  in  which 
one  Dred  Scott,  a  person  of  African  descent, 


182  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

and  once  a  slave,  was  claiming  his  freedom,  on 
the  ground  of  a  residence  with  his  master  in 
Minnesota,  a  territory  made  free  by  the  Mis 
souri  Compromise,  and  of  a  shorter  stay  in  Illi 
nois,  where  slavery  had  been  prohibited  by  the 
ordinance  of  1787.  To  maintain  his  actioii_Jjb 
wasjnecessary  that  the  plaintiff  shonlrl  be  a  m'ti- 
zen  of  the  United  States  ;  if  he  were  not  so,  the 
federal  courts  would  have  no  jurisdiction  of 
the  case.  The  first  objection  raised  by  the 
master  was  to  Scott's  citizenship,  upon  the 
ground  that  this  was  a  white  man's  govern 
ment,  and  that  no  person  of  African  blood  could 
be  a  citizen.  This  objection  was  not  sustained 
by  the  court  in  which  the  suit  was  originally 
brought,  and  the  trial  went  on  ;  but  the  court 
finally  decided  that  Dred  Scott  was  not  entitled 
to  his  freedom.  The  case  was  then  taken  up  to 
the  Supreme  Court  and  had  been  twice  argued 
there.  A  few  days  after  the  inauguration  that 
court  announced  its  decision.  The  majority  of 
the 


zen,Jbecause_hp  w?«  of  A-frinan  blood,  anrl  that 
the_courts  of  the  United  States  had,  therefore, 
no  jurisdiction  of  his  suit.  This  was  the  end  of 
the  matter,  so  far  as  Dred  Scott  was  concerned. 
From  this  judgment  there  was  no  appeal.  Two 
judges,  however,  dissented  from  the  judgment. 
In  their  opinion  Dred  Scott,  though  of  African 


THE   DEED   SCOTT   CASE.  183 

descent,  was  a  citize£_^f_the_JIniteji  States,  aruL 
^the  court  Had  jurisdiction  of  his  suit*  Having 
reached  tfns~conclusion,  it  became  necessary  for 
them  to  examine  all  the  facts  of  the  case,  and  to 
consider  the  constitutionality  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise  and  of  the  ordinance  of  1787,  and 
the  effect  of  the  plaintiff's  living  in  Minnesota 
and  Illinois ;  this  they  did  in  a  most  exhaustive 
manner,  and,  affirming  the  constitutionality  of 
both  these  enactments,  decided  in  favor  of  the 
plaintiff's  claim  to  his  freedom. 

The  Southern  and  pro-slavery  members  of  the 
court  were  unwilling  to  let  the  statements  and 
reasoning  of  these  dissenting  opinions  go  out  to 
the  country  without  some  reply  on  their  part, 
and  induced  the  chief  justice  to  violate  the  re 
cognized  and  established  judicial  proprieties,  by 
adding  to  his  opinion  a  statement  of  his  political 
views  upon  the  relations  between  the  Constitu 
tion  ,and  slavery,  as  if  this  were  a  part  of  the 
judgment  of  the  court.  It  was  a  flagrant 
abuse  of  a  judicial  position,  and  drew  from  one 
of  the  dissenting  justices,  in  no  way  a  sympa 
thizer  with  the  Republican  party  or  the  anti- 
slavery  agitators,  this  emphatic  rebuke  :  "  I  dis 
sent  from  the  assumption  of  authority  by  the 
majority  of  the  court  to  examine  the  constitu 
tionality  of  the  act  called  the  Missouri  Compro 
mise.  Having  decided  that  this  is  a  case  to 


184  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

which  the  judicial  power  of  the  United  States 
does  not  extend,  they  have  gone  on  to  examine 
the  merits,  and  so  have  reached  the  question  of 
the  power  of  Congress  to  pass  this  act.  On  so 
grave  a  subject  as  this,  I  feel  obliged  to  say  that, 
in  my  opinion,  such  an  extension  of  judicial 
power  transcends  the  limits  of  the  authority  of 
the  court." 

The  political  declaration  of  the  chief  justice 
was  in  substance  a  repetition  of  Calhoun's  doc 
trine,  that  the  territories  were  the  common  do 
main  of  the  several  states,  in  which  each  had 
equal  rights ;  that  therefore  the  people  of  every 
state  could  legally  carry  into  any  territory  and 
lawfully  hold  there  any  property  recognized  as 
lawful  in  any  state  ;  and  that  all  legislation, 
congressional  or  territorial,  limiting  or  interfer 
ing  with  the  full  and  perfect  enjoyment  of  this 
right,  was  unconstitutional  and  void.  If  this 
statement  had  been  necessary  to  the  judgment 
of  the  court  in  the  case,  it  would  have  been 
a  hard  blow  to  the  Republican  party,  whose 
avowed  object  was  the  exclusion  of  slavery  from 
the  territories  ;  but  it  was  so  obviously  a  pure 
piece  of  politics,  that,  stigmatized  as  it  had  been 
by  Mr.  Justice  Curtis,  it  only  impressed  the 
people  of  the  North  as  a  fresh  and  most  convin 
cing  proof  of  the  demoralizing  influence  of  the 
slave  power,  roused  them  to  more  strenuous 


THE  DEED    SCOTT   CASE.  185 

efforts  to  make  Kansas  free,  and  envenomed 
still  more  the  bitterness  already  existing  be 
tween  the  two  sections  of  the  country. 

Judge  Curtis  had  shown  the  Republicans  that 
the  chief  justice's  politics  were  no  part  of  the 
judgment  of  the  court ;  that  they  were  only  the 
political  views  of  a  judge  upon  questions  not 
at  the  time  judicially  before  him,  and  of  no 
binding  force  whatever.  Lincoln  and  Seward 
made  another  suggestion.  The  judgment  set 
tled  the  case  of  Dred  Scott ;  but  it  might  be  re 
versed  in  some  other  suit,  as  other  judgments 
had  been,  and  one  mission  of  the  Eepublican 
party  should  be  to  hasten  this  result. 

It  was  evident  from  the  President's  inaugural 
that  he  had  been  privately  informed  of  what  the 
court  was  to  do,  and  it  was  believed  and  asserted 
by  Eepublican  leaders  that  the  decision  had  been 
withheld  until  after  the  election,  lest  it  should 
injure  or  destroy  the  chances  of  Democratic 
success ;  and  that  nothing  would  have  been 
heard  of  the  monstrous  doctrines  of  the  chief 
justice  had  Fremont  been  chosen  President. 
Lincoln,  in  a  public  speech  in  Illinois,  attacked 
the  court  for  its  attempt  to  render  nugatory  the 
right  of  choosing  between  freedom  and  slavery, 
which  the  Kansas-Nebraska  act  assumed  the 
people  of  the  territory  to  possess.  Seward 
charged  the  court  with  forgetting,  "  in  this  ill- 


186  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

omened  act,  its  own  dignity,  which  had  always 
before  been  maintained  with  just  judicial  jeal 
ousy,"  and  both  the  court  and  the  President  with 
failing  to  remember  "  that  judicial  usurpation 
was  more  odious  and  intolerable  than  any 
other  among  the  manifold  practices  of  tyranny." 
The  resignation  of  Governor  Geary,  President 
Pierce's  last  appointee  in  Kansas,  took  effect  at 
the  close  of  the  presidential  term,  leaving  Bu 
chanan  free  to  make  his  own  appointment.  After 
much  persuasion,  he  induced  Robert  J.  Walker, 
of  Mississippi,  to  accept  the  post.  Walker  was 
a  Pennsylvania!!  by  birth,  who  had  removed  to 
Mississippi  shortly  after  he  began  the  practice 
of  the  law.  He  had  been  in  Congress,  was 
Polk's  secretary  of  the  treasury,  had  exercised 
a  large  influence  with  several  Democratic  ad 
ministrations  and  with  the  Democratic  party, 
had  advocated  the  annexation  of  Texas  and  coun 
seled  a  vigorous  prosecution  of  the  Mexican 
war,  and  was  a  man  of  much  more  prominence, 
of  larger  experience  in  public  affairs,  and  of 
greater  ability  than  is  usually  to  be  found  in  the 
office  of  governor  of  a  territory.  In  his  inaugu 
ral  address,  Buchanan  had  given  the  assurance 
that  any  constitution,  framed  by  a  convention 
in  Kansas,  should  be  submitted  to  the  people  ; 
and  before  Walker  left  for  the  West,  he  under 
stood  that  the  President  agreed  with  him  that 


THE  FINAL   STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.      187 

the  territorial  act  required  this  to  be  done. 
The  fraudulent  legislature  had  called  a  conven 
tion,  and  appointed  a  time  for  the  choice  of 
delegates.  Walker  arrived  in  the  territory 
before  the  day  fixed  for  the  election,  and  en 
deavored  to  induce  the  free-state  men  to  vote. 
They  were  afraid  to  trust  him,  and  suffered  the 
election  to  go  by  default ;  a  little  more  than  one- 
fifth  of  the  registered  voters  chose  the  delegates.1 
The  convention  met  at  Lecompton,  but  immedi 
ately  adjourned  until  after  the  regular  election 
of  a  new  territorial  legislature.  Meantime,  the 
governor,  having  satisfied  himself  that  Kansas 
was  lost  to  slavery,  though  he  still  hoped  she 
might  be  honestly  saved  to  the  Democracy,  if 
the  two  wings  of  the  Democratic  party,  the  free- 
, state  and  pro-slavery  Democrats,  would  unite, 
bent  his  energies  to  accomplishing  this,  and  to 
inducing  the  free-state  men  to  vote  at  the  regu 
lar  territorial  election.  With  some  difficulty 
they  were  persuaded  to  do  so.  The  election  was, 
on  the  whole,  a  fair  one.  In  one  precinct,  where 
there  were  about  a  hundred  voters,  the  returns 
showed  sixteen  hundred  votes  for  the  pro-slavery 

1  Had  there  been  no  frauds  and  had  the  free-state  men 
voted,  as  the  governor  urged  them  to,  they  would  have  elected 
their  own  candidates  as  delegates,  notwithstanding  that  about 
seventeen  counties,  settled  principally  from  the  North,  had 
been  practically  disfranchised  by  omitting  them  from  the 


188  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

candidate ;  in  another  more  than  twelve  hundred 
similar  votes  represented  about  twenty  settlers 
entitled  to  the  ballot.  Walker  courageously 
threw  out  these  returns,  and  the  result  gave  the 
free-state  party  the  control  of  both  branches  of 
the  territorial  legislature. 

The  Lecompton  convention  met,  pursuant  to 
its  adjournment,  and  framed  a  constitution, 
which,  by  its  terms,  could  not  be  amended  till 
1864,  and  its  provisions  as  to  ownership  in  slaves 
not  even  then.  The  article  entitled  "  Slavery  " 
declared :  "  The  right  of  property  is  before  and 
higher  than  any  constitutional  sanction,  and  the 
right  of  the  owner  of  a  slave  to  such  slave  and 
its  increase  is  the  same,  and  as  inviolable,  as  the 
right  of  the  owner  of  any  property  whatever." 

As  the  great  majority  of  the  people  of  Kansas 
considered  the  members  of  this  convention  as 
malignants,  and  its  whole  proceedings  as  an  in 
sult,  it  was  evident  that  to  submit  its  constitution 
to  a  popular  vote  would  be  merely  to  insure  its 
rejection.  To  avoid  this,  the  convention  deter 
mined  that  the  vote  should  be  only  upon  the 
question  whether  the  constitution  should  be 
adopted  with  slavery  or  without  it.  If  the  ma 
jority  should  be  for  the  constitution  with  slavery, 
the  article  quoted  was  to  remain ;  if  for  the 
constitution  without  slavery,  then  that  article 
was  to  be  stricken  out ;  slavery  was  no  longer 


THE   FINAL    STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.      189 

"  to  exist  in  the  state,  except  that  the  property 
in  slaves  already  in  the  territory  should  not  be 
interfered  with."  This  was  not  such  a  submis 
sion  of  the  constitution  to  a  vote  of  the  people 
as  Walker  had  promised.  No  pressure  from 
Washington  could  induce  him  to  accept  it  as  a 
fulfillment  of  the  requirements  of  the  law  and  of 
the  assurances  he  had  made  with  the  President's 
sanction  and  approval.  He  left  the  territory, 
and,  on  arriving  at  Washington,  finding  himself 
at  issue  with  the  President  on  this  vital  point, 
resigned,  rather  than  be  a  party  to  what  he  did 
not  hesitate  to  pronounce  a  vile  fraud. 

At  the  election  ordered  by  the  convention, 
the  total  vote  was  less  than  seven  thousand. 
For  the  constitution  without  slavery  there  were 
five  hundred  and  sixty -nine  votes  ;  for  the  con 
stitution  with  slavery,  sixty-one  hundred  and 
forty-three,  of  which  three  thousand  and  twelve 
were  fraudulent.1 

When  Walker  left  the  territory,  the  secre 
tary,  Frederic  P.  Stanton,  of  Tennessee,  also  a 
Southerner  and  a  perfectly  fair  and  upright 
man,  became  acting  governor.  At  the  instance 
of  the  people  of  Kansas  he  summoned  the  newly- 
elected  legislature  to  meet  in  December.  One 
of  its  first  acts  provided  for  a  direct  vote  on  the 
Lecompton  constitution,  and  at  the  election 

1  Wilder,  Annals  of  Kansas,  p.  156. 


190  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

held  for  this  purpose  it  was  almost  unanimously 
i  rejected,  receiving  only  one  hundred  and  sixty- 
two  votes,  out  of  ten  thousand  four  hundred. 
On  learning  of  Stanton's  action,  Buchanan  at 
once  removed  him. 

In  defense  of  his  course  as  to  Kansas  the 
President  insisted  that,  as  the  vital  question, 
whether  they  would  have  the  constitution  with 
or  without  slavery,  had  been  submitted  to  the 
people,  it  was  the  same  thing  as  if  they  had 
been  allowed  to  vote  directly  on  its  adoption  or 
rejection.  He  persisted  in  this  statement  in 
spite  of  his  knowledge  that  the  election  ordered 
by  the  convention  was  not  open  to  all  qualified 
voters,  but  that  every  citizen,  before  he  could 
deposit  his  ballot,  was  obliged  to  take  an  oath 
to  support  the  Lecompton  constitution.1  He 
also  knew  that  it  had  been  proved  that  the  set 
tlers  there  were  opposed  to  this  constitution,  by 
its  rejection  by  an  almost  unanimous  vote  at  an 
untrammeled  election. 

When  Congress  met  in  December,  it  was 
quite  understood  that  any  Democrat  who  did 
not  favor  the  admission  of  Kansas  with  the 
Lecompton  constitution  would  come  under  the 
ban  of  the  administration  ;  and  Washington  was 
full  of  speculations  as  to  what  Douglas  would 
do.  The  numbers  and  position  of  the  Republi- 

1  Lecorapton  Const.  Schedule,  Sect.  7. 


THE   FINAL    STRUGGLE    FOR   KANSAS.      191 

cans  in  both  branches  of  Congress  had  been  con 
stantly  improving.  "  It  did  look  well,"  wrote 
Seward,  "  to  see  the  array  of  twenty  solid  men  " 
on  the  floor  of  the  Senate.  There  was  no  longer 
any  attempt  at  the  ostracism,  of  which  they  had 
heretofore  been  the  victims.  "  All  personal 
antipathies  and  prejudices  against  the  party  and 
its  members  seemed  to  have  disappeared."  The 
Southern  and  Democratic  opposition  in  social 
circles  had  given  way,  and  society  of  all  classes 
was  profuse  in  its  courtesies.  As  an  illustra 
tion  of  the  changed  conditions,  we  find  Seward, 
before  the  session  is  over,  acting  as  peacemaker 
between  Jefferson  Davis  and  Senator  Chandler 
of  Michigan ;  and,  in  connection  with  Critten- 
den  and  Jefferson  Davis,  settling  a  difficulty, 
in  which  Wilson  of  Massachusetts  and  Gwin  of 
California  were  the  opposing  parties.  The 
thorny,  solitary  path  which  the  Republicans 
had  heretofore  pursued  was  now  abandoned  to 
Douglas.  The  Southern  Democrats  transferred 
to  him  their  former  hatred  of  the  Black  Republi 
cans,  and  their  courtesies  to  the  old  anti-slavery 
men  served  to  emphasize  their  treatment  of  the 
deserter. 

Arriving  in  Washington  before  the  meeting 
of  Congress,  Douglas  called  on  the  President  to 
discuss  the  Kansas  question.  Buchanan  said 
that  he  should  recommend  the  admission  of 


192  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

Kansas  under  the  Lecompton  constitution ; 
Douglas  answered  that  he  should  denounce  it 
in  the  Senate ;  and  on  the  9th  of  January  he 
did  so.  "  What  can  equal  the  caprices  of  poli 
tics  !  "  wrote  Seward.  "  The  triumph  of  slavery 
[in  1850]  would  have  been  incomplete,  indeed 
it  could  not  have  occurred,  had  it  not  been  for 
the  accession  to  it  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas.  .  .  . 
By  that  defection  he  became  soon,  and  has, 
until  just  now,  continued  (under  the  favor  or 
fear  of  successive  administrations)  legislative 
dictator  here,  intolerant,  yet  irresistible.  .  .  . 
That  was  his  position  yesterday  morning.  .  .  . 
Yesterday  he  broke  loose  from  all  that  strong 
host  he  had  led  so  long,  and  although  he  did 
not  at  the  first  bound  reach  my  position,  as  an 
ally,  yet  leaped  so  far  towards  it  as  to  gain 
a  position  of  neutrality  altogether  unsafe  and 
indefensible." 

Seward  welcomed  all  accessions  from  the  Dem 
ocrats  to  the  anti-Lecomptoii  forces.  "  Since 
Walker,  Douglas,  and  Stanton,"  he  wrote,  "  have 
been  converted,  at  least  in  part,  we  are  sure  to 
hear  the  gospel  preached  (though  with  adultera 
tion)  to  the  Gentiles."  And,  while  many  of  the 
Republican  leaders  were  distrustful  of  Douglas, 
he  took  the  opposite  view,  saying  :  "  God  forbid 
that  I  should  consent  to  see  freedom  wounded, 
because  my  own  lead,  or  even  my  own  agency 


THE   FINAL    STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.      193 

in  serving  it,  should  be  rejected.  I  will  cheer 
fully  cooperate  with  these  new  defenders  of 
this  sacred  cause  in  Kansas,  and  I  will  award 
them  all  due  praise  for  their  large  share  of  merit 
in  its  deliverance." 

The  administration  had  staked  its  all  upon 
sustaining  the  Lecompton  constitution.  Bu 
chanan's  message,  transmitting  it  to  Congress, 
showed  his  entire  surrender  to  the  extreme 
Southern  opinion.  "Kansas,"  he  said,  "is  at 
this  moment  as  much  a  slave  state  as  Georgia 
or  South  Carolina."  Before  his  message  was 
sent  in,  Denver,  who  had  succeeded  Walker  as 
governor  of  Kansas,  had  endeavored  to  dissuade 
him  from  sending  to  Congress  the  Lecompton 
constitution,  advising  him  strongly  against  his 
proposed  policy.  Buchanan  answered  that  he 
had  already  shown  his  message  and  that  the  ad 
vice  came  too  late. 

It  was  hardly  to  be  expected  that  the  debate 
on  this  question  should  add  anything  to  what 
had  already  been  said.  The  Southerners  fell 
back  on  the  doctrines  of  Chief  Justice  Taney, 
insisted  that  all  the  anti-slavery  agitation  had 
been  aimed  at  the  constitutional  rights  of  the 
South,  and  that  both  the  Missouri  Compromise 
and  the  Wilmot  Proviso  were  unconstitutional. 
In  a  speech,  made  early  in  March,  Seward 
gave  a  highly  colored  sketch  of  a  coalition  be- 


194  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

tween  the  executive  and  judicial  departments  of 
the  government,  to  undermine  the  legislature 
and  the  liberties  of  the  people,  and  of  whispered 
conferences  between  the  chief  justice  and  the 
incoming  President  before  the  delivery  of  the 
inaugural,  which  heralded,  not  the  decision  of 
the  Dred  Scott  case,  but  the  extra-judicial  ex 
position  of  the  Constitution,  which  the  chief  jus 
tice  was  about  to  promulgate.  This  drew  from 
Judge  Taney  the  declaration  that,  if  Seward  were 
elected  President,  he  should  decline  to  administer 
to  him  the  oath  of  office,  and  from  both  Taney 
and  Buchanan  indignant  denials  of  any  such  con 
ferences.  But  these  denials  did  not  meet  the  sub 
stance  of  the  charges  then  made,  not  by  Seward 
alone,  but  by  many  Republican  leaders.  These 
charges  were,  that  the  political  passages  were 
added  by  the  chief  justice  after  the  result  of 
the  presidential  election  was  known,  and  that 
their  substance  was  communicated  to  Buchanan 
just  before  the  4th  of  March,  to  enable  him  to 
make  the  announcement  which  he  did  in  his 
inaugural  address.  Known  facts  justified  the 
accusation,  even  though  they  did  not  conclu 
sively  prove  it.  It  was  understood  that  a  ma 
jority  of  the  judges,  having  reached  the  conclu 
sion  that  Dred  Scott,  being  of  African  descent, 
was  not  a  citizen,  and  had  therefore  no  standing 
in  the  courts  of  the  United  States,  an  opinion 


THE   FINAL    STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.      195 

stating  this  conclusion  and  the  reasons  for  it, 
and  nothing  more,  had  been  prepared,  to  be 
read  as  the  judgment  of  the  court ;  that  the 
chief  justice  afterwards,  and  not  long  before 
the  delivery  of  the  judgment,  added  to  his 
opinion  the  statement  of  his  political  conclu 
sions,  which  —  if  they  had  been  in  any  sense 
a  decision  of  the  court  —  would  have  fastened 
slavery  irrevocably  upon  every  foot  of  the  terri 
tory  of  the  United  States.  Buchanan's  inaugu 
ral  address  substantially  foreshadowed  these  con 
clusions  as  the  result  of  the  case,  and  it  was 
known  that  the  passage  in  which  he  did  this 
was  added  after  his  arrival  in  Washington.  It 
was  insisted  that  it  was  quite  incredible  that  he 
should  have  written  this  at  that  time  unless  he 
had  received  authentic  information  of  what  the 
chief  justice  was  to  say. 

His  long  and  unblemished  judicial  career  and 
his  patriotic  motives  have  been  urged  as  an  ex 
cuse  or  apology  for  the  chief  justice's  course  in 
this  case,  and  it  is  perhaps  only  fair  to  him  to 
suppose  that  he  may  have  thought  his  political 
statement  would  be  quietly  accepted  by  the 
North  as  an  authoritative  and  binding  construc 
tion  of  the  Constitution,  and  would  put  an  end 
to  all  anti-slavery  agitation  there ;  while,  as  it 
conceded  to  the  South  all  that  they  could  gain 
by  separation,  the  motives  for  secession  would 


196  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

no  longer  exist,  and  the  Union  would  continue 
undisturbed. 

Other  persons  disapproved  of  Seward's  speech 
for  reasons  of  an  opposite  character.  The  aim 
of  the  Kepublicans  was  to  secure  Kansas  to  free 
dom  ;  and  in  the  struggle  of  the  moment  —  the 
question  of  its  admission  under  the  Lecompton 
constitution  —  they  had  the  support  of  several 
Democrats,  among  whom  was  Douglas,  the 
author  of  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compro 
mise,  and  for  that  reason,  as  well  as  for  his 
qualities  as  a  debater,  a  most  powerful  auxiliary. 
Seward  had  already  publicly  welcomed  the  acces 
sion  of  these  new  allies,  and  announced  his 
cordial  cooperation  with  them ;  and  in  this 
speech,  after  declaring  his  opinion  that  "it 
would  be  wise  to  restore  the  Missouri  prohibition 
of  slavery  in  Kansas  and  Nebraska,"  he  went  on 
to  say :  "  But  I  shall  not  insist  now  on  so  radi 
cal  a  measure  as  the  restoration  of  the  Missouri 
prohibition.  I  know  how  difficult  it  is  for  power 
to  relinquish  even  a  pernicious  and  suicidal 
policy  all  at  once.  We  may  obtain  the  same 
result,  in  this  particular  case  of  Kansas,  without 
going  back  so  far.  Go  back  only  to  the  ground 
assumed  in  1854,  the  ground  of  popular  sover 
eignty.  Happily  for  the  authors  of  that  measure, 
the  zealous  and  energetic  resistance  of  abuses 
practiced  under  it  has  so  far  been  effective,  that 


THE   FINAL    STRUGGLE    FOR   KANSAS.       197 

popular  sovereignty  in  Kansas  may  now  be  made 
a  fact,  and  liberty  there  may  be  rescued  from 
danger  through  its  free  exercise."  It  is  difficult 
to  see  in  this  passage  anything  more  than  a 
recognition  of  the  facts  as  they  actually  existed ; 
but  it  gave  offense  to  some  persons,  who  thought 
it  implied  a  readiness  to  condone  the  repeal 
of  the  Missouri  Compromise,  and  to  welcome 
the  cooperation  of  Douglas,  who,  they  considered, 
should  have  been  received  with  reluctance,  hesi 
tation,  and  distrust. 

His  speech  on  the  Lecompton  constitution 
and  convention  is  not  one  of  Seward's  best.  It 
drags  here  and  there  ;  but  the  wrongs  of  Kansas, 
as  material  for  a  speech,  had  already  been  worn 
threadbare.  There  are  certain  passages,  how 
ever,  to  which  the  South  might  well  have  given 
heed :  — 

"The  nation  has  reached  the  point  where 
intervention  by  the  government  for  slavery  and 
slave  states  will  no  longer  be  tolerated.  Free 
labor  has  at  last  apprehended  its  rights,  its 
interests,  its  power  and  its  destiny,  and  is  organ 
izing  itself  to  assume  the  government  of  the 
republic.  It  will  henceforth  meet  you  boldly 
and  resolutely  here ;  it  will  meet  you  every 
where,  in  the  territories  or  out  of  them,  wherever 
you  may  go  to  extend  slavery.  .  .  .  The  inter 
ests  of  the  white  races  demand  the  ultimate 


198  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

emancipation  of  all  men.  Whether  that  con« 
summation  shall  be  allowed  to  take  effect,  with 
needful  and  wise  precautions  against  sudden 
change  and  disaster,  or  be  hurried  011  by  violence, 
is  all  that  remains  for  you  to  decide.  ...  It  is 
for  yourselves,  not  for  us,  to  decide  how  long 
the  contest  shall  be  protracted  before  freedom 
shall  enjoy  her  already  assured  triumph.  I 
would  have  it  ended  now.  .  .  .  But  this  can  be 
done  only  in  one  way,  —  by  the  direct  admission 
of  the  three  new  states  [Kansas,  Minnesota,  and 
Oregon]  as  free  states,  .  .  .  and  by  the  aban 
donment  of  all  further  attempts  to  extend  slavery 
under  the  federal  constitution." 

The  Kansas  question,  however,  was  not  to  be 
decided  by  argument,  or  by  any  sense  of  justice. 
The  best  men  of  the  South  did  not  venture  to 
defend  the  Lecompton  constitution,  or  the  pro 
ceedings  by  which  it  came  before  Congress,  or 
the  course  of  the  administration.  The  necessity 
of  making  Kansas  a  slave  state  was  the  govern 
ing  motive  with  those  who  supported  the  bill. 
A  few  Southerners,  notably  Bell  and  Crittenden, 
opposed  it.  But  the  administration  controlled 
the  Senate,  and  its  patronage  and  proscription 
were  freely  employed  to  enable  it  to  carry  the 
House.  The  outcome  of  the  whole  matter  for 
this  session  (1857-58)  was  the  passage  of  a  bill, 
—  a  new  compromise,  —  by  which  the  Lecomp- 


THE   FINAL    STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.      199 

ton  constitution  was  to  be  again  submitted  to 
the  people  of  Kansas  for  adoption  or  rejection. 
If  it  should  be  adopted,  the  territory  would 
receive  large  grants  of  public  lands,  and  be 
admitted  at  once  as  a  state.  If  it  should  be  re 
jected,  Kansas  was  to  remain  a  territory  for  / 
an  indefinite  period.  The  people  spurned  the 
bribe ;  the  constitution  was  a  second  time  re 
jected  by  an  overwhelming  majority.  Yet  it 
was  only  when  some  Southern  senators  had 
already  vacated  their  seats  that  the  struggle 
was  ended  in  January,  1861,  by  the  admission 
of  Kansas  as  a  free  state. 

There  was  another  matter  before  the  Senate 
this  winter,  in  which  Seward's  course  was  most 
severely  condemned  by  some  of  his  own  party. 
The  Mormons  of  Utah  were  in  a  state  of  open, 
if  not  of  avowed  rebellion.  Troops  were  needed 
to  compel  their  obedience  and  to  maintain  the 
authority  of  the  government.  The  administra 
tion  wished  to  raise  two  additional  regiments  for 
this  purpose.  The  Republicans,  distrusting  the 
President  and  remembering  the  use  to  which 
the  army  had  been  put  in  Kansas,  were  opposed 
to  giving  him  any  such  power.  Seward  thought 
the  troops  necessary  for  the  purpose  for  which 
they  were  asked,  and  that  the  President  should 
have  the  authority  he  desired.  "  It  is,"  he  said, 
"  with  a  view  to  save  life,  to  save  the  public 


200  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

peace,  to  bring  the  territory  of  Utah  into  sub 
mission  to  the  authorities  of  the  land  without 
bloodshed,  that  I  favor  the  increase  of  force 
which  is  to  be  sent  there."  A  letter  from  Senator 
Fessenden  shows  us  how  the  Kepublicans  of  the 
Senate  looked  at  the  matter.  "  Some  of  our 
people,"  he  wrote,  "  are  frightened  by  the  idea 
of  refusing  supplies  in  time  of  war.  Seward,  I 
understand,  is  to  make  a  speech  for  the  bill. 
He  is  perfectly  bedeviled.  He  will  vote  alone, 
so  far  as  the  Republicans  are  concerned ;  but 
he  thinks  himself  wiser  than  all  of  us."  Hale 
spoke  of  him  as  the  Judas  Iscariot  of  the  little 
company  of  Republicans  in  the  Senate.  Never 
theless  he  persisted  in  his  opinion,  and  spoke 
and  voted  in  favor  of  the  bill,  carrying  out  in 
his  conduct  the  policy  which  he  had  insisted  was 
correct  at  the  beginning  of  the  Mexican  war  a 
dozen  years  before,  when  he  was  still  a  private 
citizen.  The  bill,  however,  after  being  amended, 
was  at  last  defeated  by  a  vote  which  had  no 
party  significance  or  character,  Toombs  voting 
with  Seward,  and  Mason  and  Slidell  with  Fessen 
den  and  Hale.  Coercion  of  the  Mormons  became 
for  the  time  unnecessary,  as  a  truce  was  patched 
up  between  them  and  the  government. 

Subsequent  events,  however,  showed  that 
Seward  was  right  in  his  views  of  the  necessity 
of  reducing  to  strict  obedience  the  Latter  Day 


THE  FINAL  STRUGGLE  FOR  KANSAS.'  201 

Saints ;  and  had  this  been  done  earlier  there 
would  have  been  fewer  or  no  unpunished  out 
rages  upon  Christians,  no  Danite  bands,  no 
cowardly  midnight  murders  in  Utah.  Seward 
himself  must  have  felt  amply  rewarded  for  his 
speech  and  action  in  the  matter,  when  three 
years  later  he  learned  from  more  than  one  War 
Democrat  that  this  speech  had  taught  him  to 
disregard  unpatriotic  party  counsels,  and  to  stand 
by  the  government  and  the  Union. 

The  historical  interest  of  the  political  cam 
paign  of  the  summer  and  autumn  of  1858  is 
practically  confined  to  the  debates  between  Lin 
coln  and  Douglas ;  but  Seward  in  his  speech  at 
Rochester  struck  the  keynote  of  the  contest 
when  he  spoke  of  "  the  irrepressible  conflict 
between  Freedom  and  Slavery."  The  idea  was 
not  a  new  one  on  his  part,  though  the  expres 
sion  was.  If  we  read  his  speeches  we  shall 
find  him  often  before  struggling  with  a  similar 
thought,  but  never  till  now  finding  the  apt  words 
which  would  best  convey  his  meaning,  and  coin 
ing  a  phrase  which  became  at  once  a  part  of  our 
popular  speech. 

The  substance  of  the  Rochester  address  was 
an  indictment  of  the  Democratic  party  as  sec 
tional  and  local,  with  its  principal  seat  in  the 
slave  states  and  its  constituency  almost  exclu 
sively  there,  but  having  in  the  free  states  a 


202  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

number  of  supporters  sufficient  to  modify  its 
sectional  appearance  without  altering  its  sec 
tional  character,  committed  therefore  to  the 
policy  of  slavery,  and  which  had  carried  that 
policy  to  its  then  alarming  culmination.  The 
accusation  was  followed  by  a  statement  of  the 
historical  facts  justifying  it,  and  the  speech  had 
great  weight  in  the  autumn  elections.  In  the 
year  before  the  Republican  party  had  suffered  a 
grievous  setback  ;  but  the  course  of  the  Presi 
dent  in  endeavoring,  by  all  the  means  at  his 
command,  to  crowd  through  Congress  and  force 
upon  Kansas  a  constitution  odious  to  its  inhabi 
tants  and  so  tainted  with  fraud  that  even  his 
own  officers  there,  Southerners  and  slaveholders 
as  they  were,  refused  to  sustain  him,  had  done 
for  the  opponents  of  the  administration  what 
they  could  not  have  done  for  themselves.  The 
Congress  chosen  in  the  autumn  of  1858  elected, 
though  only  after  a  prolonged  struggle,  a  Re 
publican  speaker.  To  the  Senate  no  Northern 
Democrat  was  returned  except  Douglas,  and  the 
Republicans  there  now  numbered  twenty-four. 

Nothing  was  done  in  the  short  session  ending 
on  the  4th  of  March,  1859.  The  endeavors  of 
the  South  to  obtain  a  vote  to  put  thirty  mil-, 
lions  of  money  into  the  hands  of  the  President, 
in  order  to  pave  the  way  for  a  favorable  negotia 
tion  as  to  the  purchase  of  Cuba,  signally  failed; 


THE   FINAL   STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.      203 

and  a  homestead  bill,  granting  moderate  quan 
tities  of  public  lands  to  actual  settlers,  and 
warmly  pressed  by  the  Republicans,  shared  the 
same  fate.  The  antagonism  between  the  North 
and  South  was  never  more  conspicuous  than  in 
the  discussion  of  these  measures.  The  House, 
it  was  known,  would  not  pass  the  Cuba  bill,  if 
sent  down  to  them,  but  they  had  already  passed 
the  homestead  bill,  which  was  before  the  Senate, 
and  Seward  urged  laying  aside  Cuba  to  take  up 
the  homestead  bill,  saying :  "  The  Senate  may 
as  well  meet  face  to  face  the  issue.  .  .  .  The 
homestead  bill  is  a  question  of  homes  for  the 
landless  freemen  of  the  United  States.  The 
Cuba  bill  is  the  question  of  slaves  for  the  slave 
holders  of  the  United  States."  Toornbs  retorted, 
that,  much  as  he  despised  senators  who  were  dem 
agogues,  he  despised  still  more  those  who  were 
driven  by  demagogues,  and  who  met  a  great 
question  of  national  policy  by  the  cry  of  land  for 
the  landless  ;  on  which  Wade  cried  out :  "  Shall 
we  give  niggers  to  the  niggerless  or  land  to  the 
landless  ?  When  you  come  to  niggers  for  the 
niggerless  all  other  questions  sink  into  perfect 
insignificance." 

The  summer  and  autumn  of  1859  Seward 
passed  in  Europe.  When  he  returned,  the  John 
Brown  raid  in  Virginia  had  ended  in  the  exe 
cution  of  its  leader ;  Congress  had  assembled, 


204  WILLIAM  HENRY   SE  WARD. 

and  the  two  months'  contest  for  the  election 
of  speaker  was  well  under  way.  The  several 
parties  were  already  beginning  to  take  their 
positions  for  the  coming  presidential  campaign. 
The  Senate  was  practically  under  the  control  of 
the  extreme  pro-slavery  leaders,  who  were  deter 
mined  to  drive  Douglas  out  of  the  Democratic 
party  as  a  punishment  for  his  opposition  to  the 
admission  of  Kansas  under  the  Lecompton  con 
stitution.  For  this  purpose,  Jefferson  Davis  of 
fered  a  series  of  resolutions  embodying  the 
political  doctrines  enunciated  by  Judge  Taney 
in  the  Dred  Scott  case,  and  the  most  extreme 
deductions  to  be  made  from  them.  These  re 
solves  were  meant  to  be  a  complete  statement  of 
the  true  creed  of  the  Democratic  party  on  the 
subject  of  slavery,  as  revised  by  the  chief  justice. 
The  fundamental  article  was  this  :  — 

"  Resolved,  That  neither  Congress  nor  a  ter 
ritorial  legislature,  whether  by  direct  legislation, 
or  legislation  of  an  indirect  and  unfriendly 
character,  possesses  power  to  annul  or  impair 
the  constitutional  right  of  any  citizen  of  the 
United  States  to  take  his  slave  property  into  the 
common  territories,  and  there  hold  and  enjoy 
the  same  while  the  territorial  condition  re 
mains." 

Special  interest  attaches  to  this  resolution, 
from  the  fact  that  in  the  Democratic  national 


THE   FINAL    STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.      205 

convention  of  1848  a  resolve,  offered  by  Mr. 
Yancey  of  Alabama,  declaring,  "  That  the  doc 
trine  of  non-interference  with  the  right  of  prop 
erty  of  any  portion  of  the  people  of  this  con 
federacy,  be  it  in  the  states  or  territories 
thereof,  by  any  other  than  the  parties  interested 
in  them,  is  the  true  republican  doctrine  recog 
nized  by  this  body,"  —  was  rejected  by  a  vote 
of  two  hundred  and  sixteen  to  thirty-six ;  while 
against  this  resolution  of  Jefferson  Davis,  intro 
duced  in  the  Senate  eleven  years  later,  there  was 
only  one  Democratic  vote,  that  of  Mr.  Pugh  of 
Ohio.1  The  attitude  of  the  Democracy  as  re 
gards  slavery  was  clearly  not  stationary.  If  the 
Kepublicans  were  advancing  in  the  path  of 
modern  civilization,  the  Democrats  were  even 
more  rapidly  retrograding  towards  a  govern 
ment  which  should  rest  on  slavery  as  its  base. 
The  Republicans  stood  aloof,  and  left  Davis's 
resolutions  to  be  discussed  by  the  Democrats. 
They  were  adopted  by  a  strict  party  vote. 

Seward's  most  important  speech  during  the' 
session  was  on  the  bill  for  the  admission  of  Kan 
sas  under  a  new  constitution  framed  by  a  con 
vention  held  at  Wyandot,  and  composed  of  dele 
gates  from  the  actual  settlers  of  the  territory. 
In  this  speech  he  discussed  the  general  state  of 
the  country  ;  and  in  a  sketch  of  the  difference 

1  Douglas  was  absent  throughout,  from  illness. 


206  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

between  the  slave  and  free  states,  defined  the 
former  as  states  where  the  slave  was  regarded 
and  protected,  not  as  a  man,  but  as  the  capital 
of  another  man,  a  special  kind  of  capital  entitled 
to  be  politically  represented  by  its  owners,  and 
which,  with  the  increase  in  slaves,  had  become  a 
great  political  force  ;  while  in  the  free  states 
the  laborer,  invigorated  and  developed  by  the 
rights  of  citizenship,  was  himself  the  dominating 
political  power.  He  therefore  classified  the 
slave  states  as  capital  states,  and  the  free 
states  as  labor  states.  Running  a  historical 
parallel  between  these  two  classes,  he  showed  by 
the  debates  on  the  Missouri  Compromise,  —  the 
first  great  struggle  between  them,  —  how  easy  it 
was  to  combine  the  capital  states  in  defense 
even  of  their  external  interests,  and  how  difficult 
to  unite  the  labor  states  in  any  common  policy  ; 
that  the  labor  states  were  naturally  loyal  to  the 
Union,  while  the  capital  states  were  quick  to 
alarm  that  loyalty  by  threats  of  disunion,  and 
either  could  not  or  would  not  distinguish  be 
tween  legitimate,  constitutional  opposition  to  the 
creation  of  new  capital  states  out  of  the  common 
territory,  and  unconstitutional  attacks  upon 
slavery  in  the  states  where  it  already  existed. 
The  history  of  the  two  parties  proved,  he  con 
tended,  that  the  Democratic  party  was  generally 
found  sustaining  the  policy  of  the  capital  states ; 


THE   FINAL    STRUGGLE   FOR   KANSAS.      207 

while  the  Whigs,  being  usually  an  opposition 
party,  had  practiced  some  forbearance  towards 
the  interests  of  labor,  until,  in  an  evil  hour,  the 
Whig  representatives  of  the  capital  states  con 
curred  in  the  passage  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
act,  and  the  Whig  party  instantly  went  down, 
never  to  rise  again. 

To  the  charge  that  the  Republican  party  was 
a  sectional  one,  and  that  its  success  would  there 
fore  justify  secession,  he  answered :  "  Is  the 
Democratic  party  less  sectional?  Is  it  easier 
for  us  to  bear  your  sectional  sway  than  for  you 
to  bear  ours  ?  Is  it  unreasonable  that  for  once 
we  should  alternate?  But  is  the  Republican 
party  sectional?  Not  unless  the  Democratic 
party  is.  The  Republican  party  prevails  in  the 
House  of  Representatives  sometimes,  the  Demo 
cratic  party  in  the  Senate  always.  Which  of 
the  two  is  most  prescriptive?  Come,  if  you 
will,  into  the  free  states  anywhere,  address  the 
people,  submit  to  them  fully  all  your  complaints 
of  Northern  disloyalty,  oppression,  prejudice^ 
speaking  just  as  freely  and  loudly  as  you  do 
here ;  you  will  have  hospitable  welcomes  and 
ballot-boxes  for  all  the  votes  you  can  win.  .  .  . 
Extend  to  us  the  same  privileges  and  I  will  en 
gage  that  you  will  have  very  soon  in  the  South 
as  many  Republicans  as  we  have  Democrats  in 
the  North.  .  .  .  Our  policy  of  labor  in  the  terri- 


208  WILLIAM  IIENRY   SEWARD. 

tories  was  not  sectional  during  the  first  forty 
years  of  the  republic  ;  it  will  be  national  again 
during  the  third  forty  years,  and  forever  after 
wards."  He  minimized  the  dangers  of  dis 
union,  not  because  he  underrated  the  earnest 
ness  of  the  leaders  of  secession,  but  because  he 
believed  that,  refine  as  one  might  about  the  na 
ture  of  the  Constitution,  calling  it  a  compact 
between  states,  a  breach  of  any  article  of  which 
by  one  state  would  absolve  all  the  others  from 
their  allegiance,  yet  it  would  be  found,  on  any 
attempt  to  subvert  it,  to  be  a  government  of  the 
whole  people,  in  which  every  member  was  con 
scious  of  his  interest  and  power,  and  which  was 
indestructible  from  the  millions  of  fibres  by 
which  it  was  interwoven  with  the  affections,  the 
ambitions,  and  the  hopes  of  all  citizens  of  all 
classes. 


CHAPTER   XL 

THE   REPUBLICAN    CONVENTION   OF   1860. 

THE  Democratic  national  convention  o£-l£56 
had  dfttftvminftd  torpid  that  of  I860  at  Charles 
ton,  South  Carolina;  it 
towasds-the  end  of  Aprii.  The  irreconcilable 
difference  between  the  supporters  of  the  admin 
istration  and  the  followers  of  Douglas  made 
any  agreement  as  to  a  platform  impossible  ;  and, 
on  the  failure  of  the  resolutions  proposed  by  the 
South,  forty-five  of  the  one  hundred  and  twenty 
Southern  delegates  withdrew.  The  convention 
adjourned  to  Baltimore  and  there  nominated 
Douglas  for  the  presidency  ;  Herschel  V.  John 
ston,  of  Georgia,  being  afterwards  added  as  the 
nominee  for  vice-president.  The  seceding  dele 
gates  held  a  separate  convention,  and  chose  as 
their  candidates  John  C.  Breckenridge  of  Ken 
tucky,  and  Joseph  Lane  of  Oregon.  The  Con 
stitutional  Union  party,  the  survivors  of  the 
Native  American  organization,  put  John  Bell, 
of  Tennessee,  at  the  head  of  their  ticket,  and 
gave  the  second  place  to  Edward  Everett,  of 
Massachusetts. 


210  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

The  Kepublicaii  convention  assembled  at 
Chicago  on  the  16th  of  May.  The  organiza 
tion,  preparation,  and  adoption  of  the  platform 
occupied  the  first  two  days,  and  it  was  the 
general  expectation  both  of  his  friends  and  op 
ponents  that  Seward  would  be  nominated  on  the 
following  morning.  It  was  known  that  there 
was  opposition  to  him,  yet  it  was  thought  that 
the  different  elements  composing  it  would  not  be 
able  to  unite  on  any  candidate.  But  on  the 
third  ballot  Abraham  Lincoln,  of  Illinois,  was 
nominated,  a  change  of  four  votes  of  the  Ohio 
delegation  from  Chase  to  Lincoln  giving  him  the 
requisite  majority.  There  is  no  question  that  to 
the  Republican  party,  as  a  whole,  this  nomina 
tion  was  at  the  time  a  bitter  disappointment. 
Lincoln  was  a  man  comparatively  unknown.  He 
had  served  in  one  Congress  without  distinction, 
and  would  gladly  when  his  term  was  over  have 
accepted  a  subordinate  office.  Four  years  ear 
lier  he  had  received  a  respectable  vote  on  an 
informal  ballot  as  a  candidate  for  vice-president 
on  the  ticket  with  Fremont ;  but  this  was  hardly 
remembered  at  the  time  of  his  nomination  in 
1860.  His  campaign  with  Douglas  had  brought 
him  into  more  prominence,  had  shown  him  to  be 
a  clear  thinker,  and  very  ready  and  formidable 
in  debate  ;  but  the  interest  in  that  discussion 
was  comparatively  limited ;  and  he  was  best 


THE  REPUBLICAN   CONVENTION   OF  1860.    211 

known  at  the  East  by  his  address  at  the  Cooper 
Institute  in  New  York,  on  February  27,  1860. 
He  was  a  very  popular  local  politician,  but  was 
hardly  recognized  elsewhere  as  a  rising  man 
with  anything  that  could  be  called  a  national 
reputation.  The  opposition  to  Seward,  adopt 
ing  the  policy  pursued  in  previous  conventions 
by  the  opponents  of  the  great  men  of  the  respec 
tive  parties,  united  on  Lincoln  as  a  more  or  less 
colorless  candidate. 

So  far  as  the  Republican  party  in  1860  was 
not  the  inevitable  outcome  of  the  constantly 
increasing  demands  and  pressure  of  the  South, 
and  the  consequent  resistance  of  the  North,  it 
was  the  work  of  William  H.  Seward  more  than 
of  any  other  single  individual.  He  had  labored 
to  this  end  for  many  years ;  his  speeches  had 
been  printed  in  different  languages,  and  circu 
lated  by  millions,  and  had  produced  the  deepest 
and  widest  effect  on  public  opinion.  At  the 
South  he  was  fully  recognized  as  the  leader  of 
his  party,  the  price  set  on  his  head  there  being 
fifty  thousand  dollars,  while  only  twenty-five  hun 
dred  was  offered  for  that  of  any  other  prominent 
Republican. 

A  Southern  newspaper  did  no  more  than  jus 
tice  to  his  position,  when  its  editor  wrote  :  "  Mr. 
Seward  is  a  great  political  leader.  Unlike  others 
who  are  willing  to  follow  in  the  wake  of  popular 


212  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

sentiment,  Seward  leads.  He  stands  head  and 
shoulders  above  them  all.  He  marshals  his 
forces  and  directs  the  way.  The  Abolition  host 
follow.  However  we  may  differ  from  William 
H.  Seward,  we  concede  to  him  honesty  of  pur 
pose,  and  the  highest  order  of  talent.  He  takes 
no  halfway  grounds,  he  does  nothing  by  halves. 
.  .  .  He  is  at  once  the  greatest  and  most  danger 
ous  man  in  the  government.  .  .  .  For  eighteen 
years  he  has  stood  forth  in  the  Senate  of  the 
United  States,  the  great  champion  of  freedom, 
and  the  stern  opposer  of  slavery.''  If  one 
turns  from  the  estimate  of  opponents  to  the 
judgment  of  his  political  friends,  the  words  of 
Governor  Andrew  of  Massachusetts,  in  indorsing 
the  nomination  of  Lincoln,  do  not  exaggerate 
the  appreciation  of  Seward  at  that  time  in  the 
Kepublican  party :  — 

"The  affection  of  our  hearts  and  the  judg 
ment  of  our  intellects  bound  our  political  for 
tunes  to  William  H.  Seward,  —  to  him,  who  is 
the  highest  and  most  shining  light  of  this  politi 
cal  generation,  —  to  him  who,  by  the  unanimous 
selection  of  the  foes  of  our  cause,  and  our  own, 
has  for  years  been  the  determined  standard- 
bearer  of  liberty."  A  Democratic  newspaper 
announced  the  result  of  the  convention  in  an 
article  entitled  "  Action  devoured  by  his  own 
Dogs ; "  and  this  heading  had  quite  enough 


THE   REPUBLICAN   CONVENTION   OF  1860.    213 

truth  in  it  to  give  it  point,  and  to  require  no 
explanation  for  even  the  dullest  and  most  obtuse. 
Seward's  failure  to  obtain  the  nomination  at 
Chicago  was  due  to  a  variety  of  causes.  The 
influence  to  be  attributed  to  the  defection  of 
Horace  Greeley  was  probably  exaggerated  at  the 
time ;  and  the  episode  is  mostly  interesting  for 
the  light  it  throws  upon  the  characters  of  the 
two  men.  Greeley  was  commonly  thought  to 
be  an  unselfish  patriot,  but  he  had  at  bottom  a 
hunger  for  office,  and,  as  his  conduct  to  Seward 
shows,  a  strong  appetite  for  revenge.  As  has 
been  already  stated,  he  was  very  much  disap 
pointed  at  not  receiving  the  nomination  for 
governor  of  New  York  in  1854,  and  still  more 
chagrined  that  his  old  associate  and  subsequent 
rival,  Henry  J.  Raymond,  was  nominated  for 
lieutenant-governor  by  the  very  convention  in 
which  he  himself  had  been  defeated.  There  is 
nothing  to  show  that  Seward  personally  had  any- 
thing  to  do  with  this  result,  though  Weed,  be 
lieving  it  essential  to  success,  had  undoubtedly 
done  what  he  could  to  bring  it  about ;  there 
were,  however,  so  many  objections  to  nominating 
Greeley,  that  it  may  be  doubted  whether  Sew 
ard's  active  intervention  in  his  behalf  would 
have  been  of  any  avail.  The  election  was  ex 
tremely  close.  A  change  of  less  than  two  hun 
dred  votes  woidd  have  altered  the  result ;  and 


214  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

the  party  was  evidently  wise,  in  so  close  a  con 
test,  in  declining  to  handicap  themselves  with 
a  candidate  of  such  pronounced  opinions,  the 
eager  advocate  of  so  many  visionary  schemes  as 
Greeley  was  considered  to  be.  Greeley  himself 
subsequently  admitted  that  he  could  not  have 
been  chosen.  Just  after  the  election,  when  he 
was  still  extremely  sore,  he  wrote  Seward  a  letter, 
complaining  of  the  treatment  he  had  received, 
notifying  him  that  he  could  no  longer  rely  on 
his  support,  and  that  the  so-called  partnership 
of  Seward,  Weed,  and  Greeley  was  at  an  end. 
So  far  was  Seward,  however,  from  penetrating 
Greeley's  real  meaning,  that  he  shortly  afterwards 
wrote  to  Weed:  "I  have  a  long  letter  from 
Greeley,  full  of  sharp,  pinching  thorns.  I  judge, 
as  we  might  indeed  well  know,  from  his,  at  the 
bottom,  nobleness  of  disposition,  that  he  has  no 
idea  of  saying  or  doing  anything  wrong  or  un 
kind  ;  but  it  is  sad  to  see  him  so  unhappy.  Will 
there  be  a  vacancy  in  the  board  of  regents  of 
the  University  of  New  York  this  winter  ?  Could 
one  be  made  at  the  close  of  the  session,  could  he 
have  it  ?  Raymond's  nomination  and  election  is 
hard  for  him  to  bear.  ...  I  think  this  a  good 
letter  to  burn.  I  wish  I  could  do  Greeley  so 
great  a  favor  as  to  burn  his." 

Seward  did  not  suffer  this  letter  to  interfere 
with  the  personal  relations  between  himself  and 


THE   REPUBLICAN   CONVENTION   OF  1860.    215 

Greeley  ;  and  though  Greeley  opposed  Seward's 
nomination  in  1856,  yet,  if  his  opposition  was 
based  on  personal  grounds,  he  carefully  con 
cealed  them.  Ten  days  after  the  convention  of 
that  year  he  called  on  Seward  in  Washington, 
and  wished  to  be  congratulated  on  having  done 
the  very  best  thing  in  the  very  best  way.  In  the 
spring  of  1859  he  succeeded  in  satisfying  a  poli 
tician  so  astute  as  Weed  that  he  was  all  right 
politically  and  "  seeking  to  be  useful "  in  Cali 
fornia,  whither  he  was  going  ;  and  he  dined  with 
Seward  on  the  eve  of  his  departure. 

He  was  not  a  delegate  from  New  York  to  the 
Republican  convention  of  1860  ;  but  he  procured 
an  appointment  as  substitute  from  Oregon,  and 
going  to  Chicago  in  this  capacity,  devoted  his 
time  and  energy  to  defeating  Seward.  He 
nominally  advocated  the  candidacy  of  Edward 
Bates  of  Missouri,  but  was  ready  to  support 
anybody  to  beat  Seward  ;  and  it  has  been  said 
that,  when  Seward  was  actually  defeated,  he 
openly  gave  thanks  that  he  was  even  with  him 
at  last. 

Seward  had  shown  Greeley's  letter  of  1854  to 
no  one ;  but  after  the  convention  there  began  to 
be  rumors  of  its  existence,  and  Greeley  himself 
finally  printed  it  in  the  "  Tribune."  Its  publi 
cation  drew  from  Weed  an  article  in  which  he 
said  :  "  Having  remained  for  six  years  in  bliss- 


216  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ful  ignorance  of  its  contents,  we  should  have 
much  preferred  to  have  ever  remained  so.  It 
jars  harshly  upon  cherished  memories.  It  de 
stroys  ideals  of  disinterestedness  and  generosity 
which  relieved  political  life  from  so  much  that 
is  selfish,  sordid,  and  rapacious."  The  impar 
tial  reader,  who  wishes  to  think  well  of  Greeley, 
will  probably  agree  with  Weed. 

Greeley's  unaided  exertions  would  hardly  have 
resulted  in  Seward's  defeat.  There  were  other 
more  powerful  elements  at  work  for  that  end. 
The  body  of  the  Republican  party  was  composed 
of  old  Whigs  ;  but  even  among  these  there  were 
not  wanting  some  conservatives  who  had  joined 
the  party  late  and  half  reluctantly,  and  who  still 
thought  Seward  almost  dangerously  radical.  To 
those  who  had  supported  Fillmore  in  1856,  his 
nomination  would  not  have  been  acceptable ;  and 
the  Democratic  Free  Soilers  of  '48,  who  had  voted 
for  Van  Buren,  and  were  now  in  full  Republican 
communion,  were  at  heart  strongly  opposed  to 
him.  They  might  put  their  opposition  nomi 
nally  on  various  grounds ;  but  the  fundamental 
reason  was  that  he  had  always  been  a  Whig, 
till  that  party  perished,  and  never  a  Democrat. 
Those  members  of  the  convention  who  had  been 
members  of  the  Know-nothing  party  remem 
bered  Seward's  steady  and  uniform  opposition 
to  and  denunciation  of  that  party  and  its  pro- 


THE   REPUBLICAN   CONVENTION   OF  1860.    217 

scriptive  doctrines.  Many  Republicans  in  Penn 
sylvania  and  Indiana  were  still  Know-nothings, 
slightly  covered  with  a  thin  varnish  of  Republi 
canism  ;  and  the  respective  candidates  for  gov 
ernor  in  these  two  states  professed  to  think  it 
impossible  to  succeed  at  their  state  elections  in 
October,  if  Seward  were  the  national  candi 
date,  and  were  therefore  earnest  to  defeat  his 
nomination  ;  Cameron  of  Pennsylvania,  who  was 
thought  to  favor  Seward,  did  not  appear  at  the 
convention  and  took  no  steps  in  his  behalf,  and 
Ohio  had  a  favorite  son,  Chase,  whom  she  pre 
ferred  to  him.  Some  Republicans  of  more  or 
less  prominence  nominally  placed  their  opposi 
tion  to  Seward  on  the  ground  of  their  distrust 
of  a  New  York  politician  ;  they  objected  to  his 
connection  with  Weed  ;  they  admitted  him  to 
be  personally  honest,  but  thought  him  not  suffi 
ciently  averse  to  jobs  for  his  friends.  These 
objections  came  mainly  from  persons  who,  had 
they  fully  expressed  their  minds,  would  have 
given  other  reasons  why  they  wished  he  should 
not  be  nominated.  If  they  had  any  effect  upon 
the  action  of  the  convention,  it  was  so  trifling 
that  it  need  not  be  taken  into  account.  The 
nomination  was  determined  by  other  and  quite 
different  influences. 

Lincoln  was  most  ambitious  for  the  nomina 
tion,  and  had  been  working  eagerly  for  it  for 


218  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

months.  He  was  personally  a  much  more  adroit 
politician  than  Seward,  who  practically,  during 
his  whole  public  life,  relied  on  Thurlow  Weed 
to  manage  for  him.  Lincoln's  forces  were  well 
organized ;  he  had  an  earnest  committee,  deter 
mined  to  succeed,  and  not  over-scrupulous  as  to 
the  means ;  and  as  the  convention  was  at  Chi 
cago,  they  were  on  their  own  ground  and  sup 
ported  by  all  the  local  influences.  The  ques 
tion  was  how  to  consolidate  upon  Lincoln  all  the 
elements  of  the  opposition  to  Seward.  This  dif 
ficulty  was  solved  on  the  night  preceding  the 
nomination,  by  the  chairman  of  Lincoln's  com 
mittee  promising  to  Caleb  Smith,  of  Indiana, 
a  place  in  Lincoln's  cabinet  in  return  for  the 
vote  of  that  delegation,  and  giving  a  similar 
pledge  in  favor  of  Simon  Cameron  to  the  dele 
gation  from  Pennsylvania,  on  the  assurance  of 
its  support ;  the  votes  of  these  two  delegations, 
with  a  change  of  votes  by  a  few  wavering  mem 
bers  from  Ohio,  secured  Lincoln's  nomination. 
Lincoln  had  telegraphed  his  committee  to  make 
no  bargains  for  him  ;  nevertheless  he  did  not 
afterwards  repudiate  their  promises,  and  Caleb 
Smith  and  Cameron  were  both  in  his  first  cab 
inet. 

When  the  news  arrived  at  Auburn,  and  no  one 
else  there  had  the  heart  to  prepare  for  the  "  Daily 
Republican  "  newspaper  a  paragraph  approving 


THE  REPUBLICAN   CONVENTION  OF  1860.    219 

the  nomination,  Seward  himself  wrote :  "  No 
truer  or  firmer  defenders  of  the  Republican 
faith  could  have  been  found  .  .  .  than  the  dis 
tinguished  .  .  .  citizens  on  whom  the  honors  of 
the  nomination  have  fallen."  None  the  less 
keenly,  however,  did  he  feel  himself  to  be  "a 
leader  deposed  by  his  own  party  in  the  hour  of 
organization  for  decisive  battle."  Yet  instead 
of  merely  acquiescing  in  the  result  of  the  con 
vention,  and  remaining  quietly  at  home,,  as  he 
might  fairly  enough  have  done,  he  put  forth  all 
his  energies  to  insure  the  success  of  his  party, 
and  devoted  five  weeks  to  a  political  campaign 
in  New  York  and  the  northwest,  especially  in 
those  states  which  had  been  his  ardent  sup 
porters  in  the  convention. 


CHAPTER   XII. 

THE   WINTER   OF   1860-61. 

THE  narrative  of  the  events  of  the  winter  suc 
ceeding  the  election  of  Lincoln  forms  one  of 
the  most  mortifying  and  melancholy  chapters 
in  our  national  history.  The  withdrawal  of  the 
Southern  Democratic  leaders  from  their  party 
convention,  and  their  nomination  of  a  separate 
candidate  in  the  summer  of  1860,  was  a  mere 
prelude  to  the  secession  of  the  states  they  rep 
resented.  It  rendered  the  election  of  Lincoln 
certain,  and  thus  furnished  the  pretext  they 
wanted  for  carrying  out  their  long  cherished 
scheme  of  breaking  up  the  Union  and  forming 
a  new  Southern  confederacy  of  which  slavery 
should  be  the  corner-stone  and  cotton  the  king. 
They  were  not  alarmed  at  the  prospect  of  any 
injury  to  their  property  in  slaves  in  consequence 
of  the  Republican  victory,  or  of  any  diminution 
of  their  material  prosperity.  The  Democratic 
control  in  Congress  not  only  made  them  abso 
lutely  secure  from  attack,  but  left  the  incoming 
Republican  president  powerless  to  appoint  a 
single  public  officer,  from  the  members  of  his 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  221 

cabinet  down,  who  would  not  be  satisfactory  to 
the  South,  —  or  to  carry  any  measure,  or  pursue 
any  policy  which  did  not  have  its  approval. 
Moreover,  there  were  practically  no  open  issues, 
by  the  decision  of  which  the  interests  of  the 
South  could  be  materially  affected.  The  Dred 
Scott  case,  it  was  claimed,  had  settled  the 
right  to  hold  slaves  in  all  the  territories  of  the 
United  States  ;  it  could  not  be  modified  until 
the  political  complexion  of  the  Supreme  Court 
should  be  changed,  and  this  would  be,  of  neces 
sity,  a  process  requiring  many  years  and  a  succes 
sion  of  presidents  of  the  same  political  opinions. 
The  excitement,  both  North  and  South,  about  the 
fugitive  slave  law  had  practically  died  out ;  and 
the  secession  movement  had  no  strength  in  the 
border  states,  the  only  ones  having  a  material  in 
terest  in  the  observance  of  this  law,  or  suffering 
from  its  evasion. 

The  real  grievance  was  one  which  could  not 
well  be  formulated  or  put  forward  as  a  ground 
for  breaking  up  the  Union.  For  half  a  century 
the  cotton  states  and  Virginia  had  governed  the 
country;  they  had  controlled  its  policy,  made 
its  wars,  annexed  new  territory,  nominated  pres 
idents,  and  filled  the  government  bureaus  and 
departments.  They  foreboded  from  this  election 
the  end  of  their  political  domination,  and  deter 
mined  to  go  off  by  themselves,  having  faith  that 


• 
•\- 

UNIVERSITY 


222  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

the  world's  need  of  their  great  staple  would 
bring  them,  should  the  United  States  use  force 
to  prevent  their  carrying  out  their  plans,  the 
recognition  of  their  independence  by  the  leading 
countries  of  Europe,  if  not  more  material  sup 
port.  "  Our  leaders  and  public  men,  who  have 
taken  hold  of  this  question,"  wrote  Alexander 
H.  Stephens,  "  do  not  desire  to  continue  the 
Union  on  any  terms.  They  do  not  wish  any 
redress  of  wrongs  ;  they  are  disunionists  per  se, 
and  avail  themselves  of  present  circumstances  to 
press  their  objects."  1 

South  Carolina  was  in  the  van  of  the  move 
ment.  Preliminary  conferences  had  been  held 
in  Charleston  as  early  as  September,  1860,  and 
at  a  private  meeting  of  the  leading  men  on  the 
25th  of  October  it  was  unanimously  resolved 
that  South  Carolina  should  secede  in  the  event 
of  Lincoln  being  chosen  president.  To  the  legis 
lature  which  assembled  on  the  5th  of  Novem 
ber,  the  day  before  the  presidential  election,  the 
governor  in  his  message  declared  his  opinion 
that,  should  the  Republican  party  carry  that 
election,  the  only  course  for  South  Carolina 
would  be  secession  from  the  Federal  Union  ; 
that  political  indications  justified  the  conclusion 
that  other  states  would  immediately  follow,  and 
that  the  long  desired  cooperation  for  which 
1  November  30,  1860. 


THE    WINTER    OF   1860-61.  223 

so  many  citizens  had  been  waiting  would  soon 
be  realized.  From  this  time  South  Carolina 
marched  forward  in  her  revolutionary  course 
with  steady  steps,  and,  as  the  governor  had  fore 
seen,  the  other  cotton  states  were  not  slow  to 
follow.  Before  the  end  of  November  the  pre 
liminary  steps  had  been  taken  in  eight  South 
ern  states ;  within  two  months  afterwards,  six 
of  them,  —  South  Carolina,  Georgia,  Florida, 
Alabama,  Mississippi,  and  Louisiana,  —  had 
passed  ordinances  of  secession  ;  by  the  middle 
of  February  Texas  had  united  with  them  to 
form  a  Southern  Confederacy,  which  had  chosen 
a  complete  set  of  officers  to  administer  its  gov 
ernment.  They  had  also  seized  for  their  own 
use  all  the  forts,  arsenals,  and  other  public  prop 
erty  and  moneys  of  the  United  States  in  the 
South,  unfortunately  left  without  guard  or  pro 
tection,  except  Fort  Sumter,  off  Charleston, 
which  Major  Anderson  was  holding  with  a  hand 
ful  of  men,  and  Fort  Pickens,  at  Pensacola,  into 
which  a  gallant  subaltern,  Lieutenant  Slemmer, 
had  thrown  himself  with  his  company. 

The  moment  selected  for  the  outbreak  of  the 
secession  conspiracy  was  most  auspicious.  The 
administration  at  Washington  had  no  sympa 
thy  whatever  with  the  Republican  party  or  the 
dominant  sentiment  of  the  North.  Four  of 
Buchanan's  cabinet  were  from  the  South,  and 


224  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

three  of  these  were  either  open  or  ill-disguised 
secessionists,  —  while  every  one  of  the  Northern 
members  was  a  pro-slavery  Democrat,  untainted 
by  any  of  the  heresies  which  had  split  the  party 
in  1848,  and  either  indifferent  to,  or  else  a  sup 
porter  of  the  violence  and  fraud  by  which  the 
South  had  undertaken  to  gain  Kansas  for  slavery, 
as  well  as  of  the  administration's  policy  toward 
that  territory.  All  the  departments  swarmed 
with  Southern  rebels.  Washington  society  was  a 
hot-bed  of  treason  and  secession,  wholly  Southern 
in  its  sympathies ;  and  the  extremists  from  the 
South  in  Congress  were  the  closest  companions 
and  friends  of  the  President.  His  term  was 
nearly  over,  and  the  secession  leaders  relied  on 
his  political  and  personal  proclivities  and  inti 
macies,  and  on  his  general  reluctance  to  take 
responsibility,  increased,  as  they  knew  it  would 
be,  by  the  fact  that  he  was  merely  holding  over 
until  the  inauguration  of  his  successor,  as  suf 
ficient  to  prevent  any  aggressive  action  on  his 
part. 

The  President's  annual  message,  sent  to  Con 
gress  on  the  3d  of  December,  did  not  disappoint 
these  anticipations.  It  took  the  Northern  states 
and  people  severely  to  task  for  the  existing  con 
dition  of  things,  for  which,  it  said,  they  were 
wholly  to  blame.  Secession  was  unlawful ;  of 
that  there  could  be  no  question  ;  but  the  coercion 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-01.  225 

of  a  state  was  equally  unlawful,  and  in  the 
political  dilemma,  which  he  had  thus  reached, 
the  President  left  the  subject  to  Congress  and 
the  country.  It  was  generally  known  that  these 
views  had  not  merely  the  support  of  the  cab 
inet,  but  were  the  conclusions  of  the  attorney- 
general,  submitted  to  the  President  in  a  labored 
opinion.  Thus  encouraged,  the  Southern  lead 
ers  had  little  hesitation  in  following  their  in 
clinations,  and  crossing,  one  by  one,  the  narrow 
Rubicon  which  divides  idle  declamation,  vapor 
ing  threats  and  empty  braggadocio  from  actual 
rebellion  and  treason.  Within  a  month  mat 
ters  had  gone  so  far  that  South  Carolina,  hav 
ing  removed  the  buoys  and  extinguished  the 
lights  in  her  harbors,  and  occupied  by  hostile 
troops  all  the  forts  except  Sumter,  was  sending 
commissioners  to  Washington  to  treat  with  the 
government  as  a  foreign  power.  She  insisted, 
as  a  preliminary  to  all  negotiations,  upon  the  im 
mediate  evacuation  of  Sumter,  on  the  ground 
that  the  presence  of  the  United  States  troops 
there  was  a  standing  menace  to  her  sovereignty. 
Under  these  circumstances  the  attorney-general 
revised  his  opinion ;  and  approaching  the  ques 
tions  presented  him  from  a  different  point  of 
view,  reached  the  conclusion  that  it  was  the 
President's  clear  constitutional  right  and  duty 
to  defend  the  public  property,  to  resist  by  force 


226  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

any  attempt  to  drive  the  troops  of  the  United 
States  from  any  of  its  fortifications,  and  to  use 
both  the  army  and  navy,  if  necessary,  for  the 
purpose  of  aiding  the  proper  officers  in  the  exe 
cution  of  the  laws. 

Had  he  been  convinced  of  this  a  month  ear 
lier,  and  satisfied  the  President's  mind  then,  it 
is  possible  that  the  rebellion  might  have  been 
nipped  in  the  bud ;  though  it  is  extremely  doubt 
ful  if  the  small  force  disposable  for  this  purpose 
would  have  been  sufficient  to  effect  much,  unless 
the  message  and  the  proceedings  of  the  govern 
ment  had  evinced  such  a  resolute  purpose  that 
the  Southern  leaders  would  have  hesitated  about 
precipitating  a  conflict.  By  the  end  of  the  year 
they  had  gone  too  far,  and  kindled  their  own 
and  their  people's  passions  to  such  an  extent  that 
retreat  was  no  longer  possible. 

The  attorney-general  succeeded,  however,  after 
a  severe  struggle,  in  bringing  the  President  to 
his  own  standpoint.  The  cabinet  was  purged 
of  the  secessionists  (Cobb  of  Georgia,  Thomas 
of  Maryland,  who  succeeded  him,  Floyd  of  Vir 
ginia,  and  Thompson  of  Mississippi),  and  their 
places  were  filled  by  Dix,  Stanton  and  Holt; 
the  White  House  ceased  to  be  the  rendezvous  of 
Benjamin,  Mason,  Slidell,  and  Jefferson  Davis, 
the  conspirators  of  the  Senate  ;  and  the  efforts 
of  the  administration  were  loyally  and  vigor- 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  227 

ously  bent  towards  keeping  the  government  in 
tact  for  delivery  to  its  regularly  elected  suc 
cessors. 

Meantime,  the  bold  and  defiant  attitude  of  the 
cotton  states  and  their  hasty  and  rapid  strides 
towards  secession  had  caused  much  alarm  and 
a  good  deal  of  vacillation  of  opinion  and  feel 
ing  at  the  North,  even  among  the  supporters  of 
Lincoln.  Leading  Republican  newspapers  were 
suggesting  that  our  erring  brethren  should  be 
allowed  to  go  in  peace.  There  were  meetings 
in  the  large  cities  recommending  concessions 
to  save  the  Union,  —  the  concessions  suggested 
amounting  in  some  cases  to  an  abandonment  of 
everything  for  which  the  Republican  party  had 
contended ;  and  in  the  press  and  elsewhere  there 
were  from  time  to  time  hints,  that,  should  there 
'be  any  attempt  at  coercion,  the  men  from  the 
North  might  find  from  their  homes  a  fire  in 
their  rear. 

When  Congress  assembled,  the  aspect  of  affairs 
inspired  the  loyal  members  of  both  Houses  with 
profound  gloom  and  anxiety.  They  knew  that 
Washington  was  the  centre  of  innumerable  plots 
and  intrigues,  all  having  for  their  object  the 
destruction  of  the  Union.  They  felt  themselves 
absolutely  powerless,  and  the  administration, 
which  was  then  controlled  by  its  Southern  lead 
ers,  they  considered  worse  than  powerless,  be- 


228  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

lieving  it  to  be  the  mere  tool  of  the  enemies  of 
the  country.  In  this  great  crisis  no  man  dis 
tinguished  himself  as  a  leader.  Many  men  of 
experience  in  public  affairs,  of  character,  reso 
lution,  and  intelligence,  seemed  hopelessly  bewil 
dered  ;  they  made  speeches,  proposed  and  voted 
for  measures,  and  took  positions,  which  are  only 
to  be  explained  by  their  desire  to  postpone  any 
violent  outbreak  until  after  the  4th  of  March, 
lest  on  that  day  Washington  should  be  in  the 
hands  of  the  rebels,  and  Lincoln  trying  to  find 
some  safe  retreat  where  he  might  take  the  oath 
of  office  as  President  of  the  United  States. 
This  fear  was  by  no  means  a  groundless  panic, 
but  a  well  justified  apprehension.  From  early 
in  January,  1861,  the  senators  from  seven  South 
ern  states  were  sitting  in  a  room  at  the  Capitol, 
as  a  revolutionary  council,  directing  every  move-' 
ment  toward  secession,  and  preparing  the  pro 
gramme  to  be  carried  out  in  the  formation  of  the 
Confederacy.  There  were  several  months  when 
the  capture  of  Washington  by  surprise  would 
have  been  perfectly  feasible ;  but  so  long  as 
Buchanan,  the  President  whom  the  South  had 
elected,  and  who  had  faithfully  done  its  bidding, 
was  in  office,  it  was  not  easy  to  find  a  pretext  for 
seizing  the  capital.  To  do  so  would  have  been, 
not  the  assertion  of  independence,  but  an  act  of 
offensive  warfare,  for  which  the  seceding  states 


THE    WINTER    OF   1860-61.  229 

were  not  yet  prepared ;  and  so  they  delayed ; 
the  chances  for  the  success  of  a  sudden  attack 
were  constantly  diminishing,  yet  it  was  never 
certain  until  some  time  after  Lincoln's  inaugura 
tion  that  such  an  attack  would  not  be  made,  and 
Washington  be  captured. 

It  needs  but  little  reflection  to  convince  one 
that  the  plan  of  letting  our  erring  brethren  de 
part  in  peace  was  impracticable  and  visionary ; 
that  it  would  have  merely  postponed  till  after 
the  recognition  of  their  secession  and  independ 
ence  the  settlement  of  difficulties,  which  would 
then  surely  have  given  rise  to  war.  An  inde 
pendent  North  would  never  have  consented  to 
return  a  fugitive  slave  to  the  seceded  South ;  yet 
the  Southern  Confederacy  must  have  insisted  at 
all  hazards  on  some  provision  for  this  purpose, 
in  any  treaty  of  separation,  or  they  would  have 
lost  rather  than  gained  by  secession.  The  policy 
of  conciliation,  however,  acquired  new  strength 
from  its  advocacy  in  various  New  York  papers, 
and  especially  from  an  editorial  by  Thurlow 
Weed,  which  was  supposed  to  have  been  inspired 
by  Seward,  and  to  represent  his  views.  Seward 
had  in  fact  no  knowledge  of  the  article  before 
its  publication,  and  Weed  was  alone  responsible 
for  it.  But  the  personal  and  political  relations 
between  Seward  and  Weed  naturally  gave  rise 
to  suspicions  of  his  connection  with  it,  and  these 


230  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

were  confirmed  by  the  positive  statement  at  the 
office  of  the  "  New  York  Tribune  "  that  Seward 
not  only  wrote  the  article,  but  was  meditating  a 
great  compromise  after  the  fashion  of  Clay  and 
Webster.  This  whole  statement,  whether  mali 
cious  or  not,  was  absolutely  false,  and  it  annoyed 
Seward  extremely.  He  had  nothing  in  view, 
no  plan  but  to  wait,  drifting  like  the  rest.  "  I 
am  thus  far  silent,"  he  writes  to  his  wife,1  "  not 
because  I  am  thinking  of  proposing  compro 
mises,  but  because  I  wish  to  avoid,  myself,  and 
restrain  other  Republicans  from  intermeddling 
just  now,  when  concession,  or  solicitation,  or 
solicitude  would  encourage,  and  demonstrations 
of  firmness  of  purpose  would  exasperate ; " 
and  again,  a  day  or  two  later,  he  says:  "An 
other  day  in  the  Senate.  Vaporing  by  Southern 
senators;  setting  forth  the  grievances  of  their 
section,  and  requiring  Northern  senators  to  an 
swer,  excuse  and  offer  terms  which  they  are  told 
in  the  same  breath  will  not  be  accepted."  2 

He  was  desirous,  if  possible,  to  find  some  solu 
tion  of  the  "  difficult  task  of  trying  to  reconcile 
the  factious  men  bent  on  disunion,  reckless  of 
civil  war,  to  the  ascendency  of  an  administration 
based  on  the  principles  of  justice  and  human 
ity."  But  he  had  no  faith  that  any  constitu 
tional  amendment  that  might  be  proposed  would 

1  December  8,  1860.  2  December  11,  1860. 


THE    WINTER   OF  1860-61.  231 

be  of  any  avail.  He  had  written  earlier:  "No 
amendment  that  can  be  proposed,  and  would  be 
satisfactory,  can  get  two  thirds  of  both  Houses, 
although  just  such  amendments  might  pass 
three  fourths  of  the  states  in  convention."/' 

Besides  his  conviction  that  the  Fabian  policy 
was  the  best,  Seward  had  another  reason  for 
silence.  He  must  have  shared  the  general  ex 
pectation  that  he  would  be  offered  a  seat  in 
Lincoln's  cabinet,  and  was  therefore  unwilling 
to  make  or  assent  to  any  proposals  which  might 
not  meet  the  approval  of  the  incoming  President, 
or  be  in  accord  with  the  policy  of  his  administra 
tion.  Ten  days  after  the  meeting  of  Congress  a 
letter  from  Mr.  Lincoln  invited  him  to  become 
secretary  of  state ;  and  he  left  Washington  that 
he  might  consult  his  wife  and  Weed  before  com 
ing  to  a  decision. 

He  was  by  no  means  certain  what  he  had 
better  do,  and  wished  for  some  more  definite 
knowledge  as  to  who  were  likely  to  be  his  asso 
ciates  in  the  cabinet,  and  as  to  Mr.  Lincoln's 
general  policy.  Weed  had  already  been  asked 
to  come  to  Springfield  for  a  conference  with  the 
President-elect,  and  at  Seward's  suggestion  he 
decided  to  go  at  once.  While  he  was  there  Mr. 
Lincoln  talked  to  him  with  entire  frankness,  and 
Weed  in  return  stated  his  own  opinions  with  ab 
solute  freedom.  Weed  came  away,  satisfied  that 


232  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

Chase  was  to  be  secretary  of  the  treasury,  and 
Bates  attorney-general,  that  Indiana  was  to  have 
a  place  in  the  cabinet,  and  that  Pennsylvania 
would  probably  be  represented  there  by  Cam 
eron,  that  Gideon  Welles  was  to  be  secretary 
of  the  navy,  and  that  the  only  remaining  post 
was  likely  to  be  offered  to  Montgomery  Blair. 
Against  these  last  two  nominations  Weed  pro 
tested  strongly.  Many  men  might  be  named,  he 
said  with  perfect  truth,  any  one  of  whom  would 
be  more  satisfactory  to  New  England,  and  better 
qualified  to  be  secretary  of  the  navy,  than  Mr. 
Welles.  He  was  satisfied,  however,  that  what 
he  said  did  not  affect  Mr.  Lincoln's  previous 
decision,  though  he  did  not  learn  till  much  later 
that  this  appointment  was  made  at  the  vice- 
president's  special  request.  To  Blair  he  ob 
jected,  because  he  represented  nobody  and  had 
no  following ;  because  his  appointment  would  be 
obnoxious  to  the  Union  men  of  Maryland,  who 
were  old  Whigs,  while  he  had  been  always  a 
Democrat,  and  till  1858  an  office-holder  under 
Buchanan;  and  also  because,  though  he  was 
now  called  a  citizen  of  Maryland,  he  actually 
lived  in  the  District  of  Columbia.  To  appoint 
both  Welles  and  Blair  would,  Weed  urged,  give 
an  undue  prominence  in  the  administration  to 
the  Democratic  element  among  the  Eepublicans, 
as  it  would  leave  the  Whigs,  who  were  a  major- 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  233 

ity  in  the  party,  in  a  minority  in  the  cabinet. 
It  was  evident  to  him,  however,  "  that  the  selec 
tion  of  Montgomery  Blair  was  a  fixed  fact," 
unless  some  Union  man  from  one  of  the  more 
southern  states,  who  was  of  undoubted  loyalty 
and  acceptable  to  Lincoln,  could  be  prevailed 
on  to  take  the  place.  At  Weed's  instance,  Mr. 
Lincoln  made  the  attempt  to  induce  a  gentle 
man  of  this  description  to  come  into  the  cabinet, 
but  the  hopelessness  of  keeping  these  states  in 
the  Union  made  all  efforts  in  this  direction 
fruitless. 

On  his  journey  home  Weed  saw  Seward,  told 
him  all  he  had  learned  as  to  the  plans  for  the 
cabinet,  and  also  the  concessions  which  Lincoln 
was  willing  to  make  for  peace  and  harmony. 
Seward  returned  at  once  to  Washington,  and 
after  thinking  over  the  matter  for  two  or  three 
days,  in  the  light  of  the  information  he  had  re 
ceived  from  Weed,  whose  conclusions  as  to  the 
composition  of  the  cabinet  were  subsequently 
shown  to  be  absolutely  correct,  he  wrote  to  Mr. 
Lincoln  that,  after  due  reflection  and  with  much 
self -distrust,  he  had  concluded  that,  should  he  be 
nominated  and  confirmed  as  secretary  of  state,  it 
would  be  his  duty  to  accept  the  appointment. 

During  Seward's  absence  at  Auburn,  Critten- 
den  had  offered  in  the  Senate  a  series  of  reso 
lutions  proposing  various  constitutional  amend- 


234  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

merits.  The  Missouri  Compromise  was  to  be 
restored,  and  extended  to  the  Pacific ;  the  fugi 
tive  slave  law  was  to  be  amended,  so  that  the 
government  should  pay  for  a  rescued  slave ; 
there  were  to  be  constitutional  provisions,  pro 
hibiting  Congress  from  abolishing  slavery  in 
any  place  under  its  exclusive  jurisdiction  in  a 
slaveholding  state,  —  or  in  the  District  of  Co 
lumbia  (so  long  as  slavery  existed  in  Maryland 
or  Virginia) ;  and  from  interfering  with  the 
transportation  of  slaves  by  land  or  water  from 
any  one  slave  state  or  territory  to  any  other 
slave  state  or  territory. 

The  resolutions  were  referred  to  a  select 
committee  of  thirteen,  of  whom  Seward  was  one, 
who  were  "to  consider  the  grievances  between 
the  slaveholding  and  non-slaveholding  states, 
and  to  suggest  if  possible  a  remedy."  At  the 
close  of  the  first  day's  session  of  this  committee, 
he  wrote  to  his  wife  :  "  We  came  to  no  compro 
mise,  and  we  shall  not."  Toombs  makes  Sew 
ard  responsible  for  this  result.  "  I  supported 
Crittenden's  compromise,"  he  says,  "  heartily 
and  sincerely,  although  the  sullen  obstinacy  of 
Seward  made  it  almost  impossible  to  do  any 
thing.  ...  At  length  I  saw  that  the  compromise 
must  fail.  With  a  persistent  obstinacy  that  I 
have  never  yet  seen  surpassed,  Seward  and  his 
backers  refused  every  overture.  I  then  tele- 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  235 

gi  aphed  to  Atlanta :  c  All  is  at  an  end.  North 
determined  ;  Seward  will  not  budge  an  inch. 
Am  in  favor  of  secession.' ' 

On  his  first  meeting  with  the  committee 
Seward  offered,  with  the  unanimous  consent  of 
the  other  Republican  members,  three  proposi 
tions  embodying  the  concessions  which  they 
understood  Mr.  Lincoln  would  sanction.  These 
were:  First,  A  constitutional  amendment  pro 
viding  that  the  Constitution  should  never  be 
altered  so  as  to  authorize  Congress  to  abolish  or 
interfere  with  slavery  in  the  states.  Second: 
A  modification  of  the  fugitive  slave  act  so  as  to 
secure  to  any  alleged  fugitive  from  service  a 
trial  by  jury  in  the  state  where  he  was  arrested. 
Third:  A  recommendation  to  all  the  states  to 
revise  their  legislation  concerning  persons  re 
cently  resident  in  other  states,  and  to  repeal  all 
such  laws  as  were  in  contravention  of  the  Con 
stitution  of  the  United  States  or  of  any  law  of 
Congress  in  pursuance  thereof.1  And  later,  with 
the  concurrence  of  the  other  Republicans,  he  of 
fered  a  fourth  resolution :  That  Congress  should 
pass  a  law  to  punish  all  persons  engaged  in  the 
armed  invasion  of  one  state  from  another  or  in 
complicity  with  such  invasions. 

1  This  was  aimed  at  the  personal  liberty  bills  of  the  North, 
the  laws  of  South  Carolina  as  to  colored  seamen  and  the  similar 
statutes  of  other  states. 


236  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

Nothing,  however,  came  of  Crittenden's  reso 
lutions,  or  of  Seward's  propositions.      Neither 
the  Senate  committee  of  thirteen,  nor  a  more 
numerous  committee  appointed  by  the  House  for 
a  similar  purpose,  nor  a  Peace  Convention  assem 
bled  in  Washington  later  in  the  winter  at  the 
invitation  of  Virginia,  were  able  to  make  any 
suggestions  which  would   be  acceptable  to  the 
North,    and   would   also   induce   the   South   to 
abandon  its  scheme  of  secession.     The  only  ef 
fect  of  all  the  conferences  and  discussions  was 
to  postpone  any  further  overt  acts  by  the  South 
and  to  enable   Buchanan  to   see  his  successor 
inaugurated   as   the  nominal  President   of   the 
whole  United  States.    The  Republicans  expected 
nothing  more,  and  were   only  fearful  lest  this 
should  not  be  safely  accomplished.    The  seceding 
South  meant  to  break  up  the  Union,  and  could 
only  have  been  diverted   from  its  purpose  by 
the  acquiescence  of  the  North  in  the  substance 
of    the    demands    set   forth    in    the    resolutions 
offered  by  Jefferson  Davis  in  the  Senate's  select 
committee,  which  proposed  :    "  That  it  should  be 
declared  by  an  amendment  of  the  Constitution, 
that  property  in  slaves,  recognized  as  such  by  the 
local  law  of  any  of  the  states  of  the  Union,  shall 
stand  on  the  same  footing  in  all  constitutional 
and  Federal  relations  as  any  other  species  of 
property  so  recognized ;  and  like  other  property 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  237 

shall  not  be  subject  to  be  divested  or  impaired 
by  the  local  law  of  any  other  state,  either  in 
escape  thereto,  or  by  the  transit  or  sojourn  of 
the  owner  therein.  And  in  no  case  whatever 
shall  such  property  be  subject  to  be  divested  or 
impaired  by  any  legislative  act  of  the  United 
States  or  any  of  the  territories  thereof." 

"  The  people  of  the  South,  all  of  the  Southern 
states,"  wrote  Seward,  "  are  in  the  lead  of  reck 
less  politicians.  They  are  bent  on  coercing  the 
free  states  into  a  recognition  of  slavery,  and  fail 
ing  that,  into  a  civil  war  and  disunion."  To 
this  recognition,  whether  by  amendments  to  the 
Constitution  or  otherwise,  no  Republican  could 
assent. 

The  debates  of  the  winter,  the  wide-spread 
publicity  given  to  the  pretensions  of  the  South, 
the  peremptoriness  and  arrogance  with  which 
its  claims  were  insisted  on,  and  the  rejection 
of  every  scheme  of  compromise  or  adjustment 
proposed  by  any  Northern  senator  or  represent 
ative  brought  home  to  the  people  of  the  free 
states  a  realizing  sense  of  the  impossibility  of 
preventing  the  South  from  attempting  to  break 
up  the  Union,  unless  they  were  prepared  to  con 
cede  that  this  was  a  government  in  every  part  of 
which  negroes  might  be  lawfully  held  in  bond 
age,  and  which  had  for  the  object  of  its  exist 
ence  the  maintenance  and  perpetuation  of  Afri 
can  slavery. 


238  WILLIAM  HENRY    SEWARD. 

In  this  winter  of  talk  Seward  made  a  speech, 
on  the  12th  of  January,  in  which  he  endeavored 
to  set  before  the  country  a  picture  —  drawn 
in  colors  as  glowing  as  possible  —  of  the  ad 
vantages  of  the  Union ;  to  describe  what  it 
had  done  for  us,  how  under  it  we  had  grown 
from  feeble  colonists  to  a  great  nation,  happy 
and  prosperous  at  home,  respected  and  feared 
abroad;  and  to  contrast  with  this  the  result 
which  would  follow  the  dissolution  of  the  gov 
ernment  into  several  confederacies,  each  of 
which  would  be  unimportant  and  disregarded; 
each  would  have  its  own  policy,  and  would 
endeavor  to  stipulate  with  other  countries  for 
arrangements  advantageous  to  itself,  though  in 
jurious  to  its  neighbors.  Their  mutual  jeal 
ousies  would  encourage  civil  wars,  which  must 
ultimately  result  in  the  loss  of  their  liberties 
and  the  destruction  of  their  independent  repub 
lican  governments.  Neither  North  nor  South 
would  suffer  the  other  section  to  possess  our 
entire  national  domain,  nor  would  any  peace 
able  division  of  this  be  possible.  The  resources 
of  the  slave  states  might  be  called  on  to  put 
down  risings  of  the  slaves,  or  possibly  to  meet 
invasions  of  their  territory  more  extensive  and 
formidable  than  John  Brown's  attack  upon 
Harper's  Ferry.  Dissolution  would  arrest  the 
growth  of  the  country,  paralyze  its  industries 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  239 

and  commerce,  and  substitute  for  the  brilliant 
constellation  of  our  United  States,  the  feeble 
light  of  small  groups,  or  the  uncertain  glimmer 
of  solitary  stars. 

Yvrhile  not  even  for  peace  and  the  mainte 
nance  of  the  Union  would  he  make  concessions 
that  involved  "  any  compromise  of  principle  or 
any  advantage  of  freedom,"  yet  he  would  "  meet 
prejudice  with  conciliation,  exaction  with  con 
cession  which  surrenders  no  principle,  and  vio 
lence  with  the  right  hand  of  peace."  He  sug 
gested  in  the  Senate  the  propositions  he  had 
already  offered  in  the  committee  of  thirteen,  and 
urged  the  immediate  admission  of  Kansas,  as 
settling  all  that  was  vital  or  even  important  as 
to  the  question  of  slavery  in  the  territories. 

In  a  second  speech  a  few  weeks  later  he  fur 
ther  explained  his  position  upon  this  question. 
The  territories  of  the  United  States,  he  said, 
contained  more  than  a  million  square  miles,  over 
which  a  slave  code  had  been  in  force  for  twelve 
years;  but  though  during  this  time  the  courts, 
the  legislature,  and  the  administration  had  main 
tained  and  guaranteed  slavery  there,  yet  only 
twenty-four  African  slaves  were  to  be  found  in 
that  whole  region,  one  slave  for  every  forty-four 
thousand  square  miles.  He  had,  therefore,  no 
further  fears  as  to  this  great  public  domain. 
Slavery  there  had  ceased  to  be  a  practical  ques 
tion. 


240  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

Afterwards,  during  this  same  session,  when 
Colorado,  Dakota,  and  Nevada  were  carved  out 
of  this  vast  country,  the  acts  organizing  them 
as  territories,  which  were  reported  by  a  senator 
from  Missouri,  a  strong  supporter  of  the  Breck- 
enridge  Democracy,  and  which  contained  no  pro 
hibition  of  slavery,  received  the  votes  of  such 
stalwart  anti-slavery  men  as  Sumner,  Wade,  and 
Chandler  of  the  Senate,  and  Thaddeus  Stevens, 
Owen  Love  joy,  and  the  radical  Republicans  in 
the  House ;  no  one  of  whom  thought  it  worth 
while  to  explain  or  justify  the  omission  of  the 
proviso  prohibiting  slavery,  which  they  had  so 
long  and  hotly  contended  was  of  vital  impor 
tance. 

It  was  said  on  the  one  hand  that  Seward  in 
these  speeches  had  "  surrendered  his  principles 
and  those  of  his  party  to  avert  civil  war  and 
the  dissolution  of  the  Union ;  "  on  the  other 
hand  he  was  denounced  because  he  would  "  give 
up  nothing  at  all,  not  even  his  prejudices  or 
caprices,  to  save  peace  and  the  Union,  the  most 
inestimable  of  all  blessings ;  "  whilst  there  were 
others  who  thanked  him  for  his  attempt  to  save 
the  Union,  "  without  damage  to  the  sacred  cause 
of  freedom,  and  the  safeguard  of  its  laws." 

He  himself  considered  the  "  concessions  "  in 
his  speech  "not  compromises  but  explanations." 
And  as  they  were  substantially  only  assurances 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  241 

that  he  was  prepared  to  abide  by  the  Constitu 
tion  as  it  was  and  would  not  seek  to  amend  or 
alter  it  except  by  a  convention  duly  called  for 
that  purpose,  his  own  conclusion  may  be  fairly 
accepted  as  correct. 

To  the  charge  that  he  had  made  a  Union 
speech  and  not  an  anti-slavery  one,  Seward  re 
plied  :  "  Twelve  years  ago  freedom  was  in  dan 
ger,  and  the  Union  was  not.  I  spoke  then  so 
singly  for  freedom,  that  short-sighted  men  in 
ferred  that  I  was  disloyal  to  the  Union.  .  .  . 
To-day,  practically,  freedom  is  not  in  danger ; 
and  Union  is.  With  the  loss  of  Union  all  would 
be  lost.  Now,  therefore,  I  speak  singly  for  Union, 
striving  if  possible  to  save  it  peaceably ;  if  not 
possible,  then  to  cast  the  responsibility  upon  the 
party  of  slavery.  For  this  singleness  of  speech 
I  am  now  suspected  of  infidelity  to  freedom.  In 
this  case,  as  in  the  other,  I  refer  myself  not  to 
the  men  of  my  time,  but.  to  the  judgment  of  his 
tory." 

Perhaps  the  clearest  insight  into  Seward's 
hopes  and  expectations  at  this  time  is  to  be 
gained  from  a  letter  of  Lord  Lyons,  the  British 
minister  at  Washington,  to  Lord  John  Russell, 
then  secretary  of  state  for  foreign  affairs.  "  Mr. 
Seward's  real  view  of  the  state  of  the  country," 
he  writes,  "  appears  to  be,  that  if  bloodshed  can 
be  avoided  until  the  new  government  is  installed, 


242  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

the  seceding  states  will  in  no  long  time  return  to 
the  confederation.  He  seems  to  think  that  in 
a  few  months  the  evils  and  hardships  produced 
by  secession  will  become  intolerably  grievous  to 
the  Southern  states ;  that  they  will  become 
completely  reassured  as  to  the  intentions  of  the 
administration,  and  the  conservative  element 
which  is  now  kept  under  the  surface  by  the 
violent  pressure  of  the  secessionists  will  emerge 
with  irresistible  force.  From  all  these  causes  he 
confidently  expects  that,  when  elections  for  the 
state  legislatures  are  held  in  November  next, 
the  Union  party  will  have  a  clear  majority,  and 
will  bring  the  seceding  states  back  into  the 
confederation.  He  then  hopes  to  place  himself 
at  the  head  of  a  strong  Union  party  having 
extensive  ramifications  both  North  and  South, 
and  to  make  '  Union  or  Disunion,'  not  '  Freedom 
or  Slavery,'  the  watchword  of  political  parties." 

Seward  himself  had  expressed  something  of 
the  same  thought  in  the  closing  passages  of  his 
speech  at  the  dinner  of  the  New  England  So 
ciety  in  New  York  on  the  22d  of  December, 
just  after  he  had  learned  from  Weed  Mr.  Lin 
coln's  views,  the  concessions  he  was  willing  to 
make,  and  his  tone  toward  the  South.  He 
said :  "  The  necessities  which  created  this  Union 
are  stronger  to-day  than  they  were  when  the 
Union  was  cemented ;  these  necessities  are  as 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  243 

enduring  as  the  passions  of  men  are  short  lived 
and  effervescent.  The  cause  of  secession  was  as 
strong  on  the  night  of  November  6th,  when  a 
President  and  Vice-President  were  elected  who 
were  unacceptable  to  the  slave  states,  as  it  has 
been  at  any  time.  Fifty  days  have  passed  ; 
and  I  believe  that  every  day  the  sun  has  set 
since  that  time,  it  has  set  upon  mollified  pas 
sions  and  prejudices;  and  if  you  will  only 
await  the  time,  sixty  more  suns  will  shed  a 
light  and  illuminate  a  more  cheerful  atmos 
phere" 

Taken  in  its  connection,  the  meaning  of  the 
passage  in  italics  is  obvious.  Sixty  days  more 
will  see  the  inauguration  of  a  new  President, 
whose  administration  will  dispel  doubts,  clear 
the  air,  purge  the  government  of  secessionists 
and  conspirators,  and  cheer  the  heart  of  every 
loyal  lover  of  the  Union.  But,  wrested  from 
their  context,  these  words  were  tortured  into  a 
prophecy  that  the  war  of  secession  would  be  at 
an  end  in  sixty  days,  and  were  constantly  quoted 
to  show  how  false  a  prophet,  how  blind  to  the 
signs  of  the  times,  and  how  untrustworthy  a 
guide  Seward  was.  Even  if  this  had  been  their 
real  meaning,  he  would  not  have  been  alone 
at  that  time  in  his  opinion  that  the  war,  if  it 
came,  would  be  a  short  one.  An  observer 
equally  intelligent,  with  equal,  if  not  superior, 


244  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

opportunities  of  seeing  and  knowing  the  actual 
condition  of  the  South  and  Southern  opinion, 
General  Grant  himself,  has  left  on  record  a 
statement  that  during  the  winter  of  1860—61, 
and  indeed  until  after  the  battle  of  Shiloh,  he 
believed  that  the  war  would  be  over  in  ninety 
days.1 

It  was  not  Seward's  natural  optimism  which 
led  him  and  many  others  with  him  to  the  be 
lief  that  the  advent  of  Lincoln's  administration 
would  bring  a  brighter  outlook  for  the  Union. 
Secession  was  as  yet  confined  to  the  cotton  and 
gulf  states.  It  was  believed  that,  unless  joined 
by  others,  these  states  alone  had  not  power  to 
break  up  the  Union.  In  the  other  slave  states 
there  were  marked  indications  of  a  strong  Union 
feeling;  in  several,  a  distinct  Union  majority. 
At  the  North  the  hope  was  very  generally  enter 
tained  that  Lincoln's  inaugural  and  the  whole 
tone  of  his  administration  would  allay  the  pas 
sions  and  calm  the  fears  of  the  people  of  those 
slave  states  that  had  not  passed  secession  ordi 
nances,  and  that  they  would  remain  loyal.  But 
those  who  had  this  hope  did  not  reckon  upon 
the  strength  of  the  family  affections  and  the 
wide  ramifications  of  family  ties  among  the  dom 
inant  class  in  the  slaveholding  states.  They 
overlooked  the  natural  effect  of  the  slavehold- 

1  Grant's  Autobiography,  i.  p.  222. 


THE    WINTER    OF  1860-61.  245 

ers'  loyalty  to  one  another,  of  their  strong  sec 
tional  sympathies  and  of  their  fidelity  to  their 
supposed  common  interest  in  slavery.  They  for 
got  the  Southerners'  dislike  to  the  North,  the 
feeling  they  had  that  they  were  looked  down 
upon  as  slaveholders,  were  treated  as  inferior 
in  civilization  and  humanity,  and  the  belief, 
common  in  the  slave  states,  that  Northern  in 
termeddling  with  their  domestic  institutions  was 
the  cause  of  all  their  difficulties.  Nor  did  those 
people  who  were  still  hopeful  of  the  Union  in 
any  way  anticipate  the  expedients  to  which  the 
secessionist  leaders  would  resort  to  drag  any 
doubting  state  into  disunion,  or  to  stifle  the 
voice  of  the  majority  when  they  feared  it  was 
against  them. 


CHAPTER   XIII. 

THE   CABINET.  —  FORT   SUMTER. 

DURING  the  winter  Mr.  Lincoln  had  endeav 
ored  without  success  to  select  some  Southern  man 
as  a  member  of  his  cabinet.  When  he  reached 
Washington  on  the  23d  of  February,  there  was 
still  one  place  which  was  supposed  to  be  open ; 
and,  in  the  scramble  and  intriguing  for  this, 
there  was  a  moment  when  it  seemed  as  if  Sew- 
ard  would  withdraw.  The  President's  decision 
to  nominate  Montgomery  Blair  for  this  post 
was  no  surprise  to  Seward.  The  statements  of 
Weed  on  returning  from  Springfield  in  Decem 
ber  had  quite  prepared  him  for  this  as  well 
as  for  all  the  other  cabinet  appointments.  He 
had  no  personal  objections  to  Mr.  Blair,  and 
no  reluctance  to  serve  with  him  as  a  colleague. 
The  selection,  however,  gave  great  offense  not 
only  to  the  leading  Whigs,  the  most  numerous 
body  of  Lincoln's  supporters,  since  it  left  them 
a  minority  of  the  cabinet  ministers ;  but  also 
to  many  Republicans  of  Democratic  antecedents, 
who,  while  recognizing  the  ability  of  the  Blairs, 
both  disliked  and  distrusted  them.  It  was  also 


THE    CABINET.  247 

especially  objectionable,  for  the  reasons  already 
given,  to  the  Union  men  of  Maryland,  by  whom 
Mr.  Blair  was  not  recognized  as  a  Marylander, 
and  of  whom,  as  they  were  substantially  of  old 
AVhig  stock  and  descent,  Mr.  Blair,  as  a  Demo 
crat  and  a  stranger,  was  in  no  sense  a  repre 
sentative.  Under  these  circumstances,  Blair's 
friends  were  naturally  uneasy,  lest  the  President 
should  for  some  reason  change  his  mind  before 
the  nomination  was  actually  made ;  and, 
rumors  of  such  a  change  were  flying  about  Wash 
ington  three  or  four  days  before  the  inaugura 
tion,  one  of  these  gentlemen,  a  personal  friend 
of  the  President,  asked  him  if  they  were  true. 
Mr.  Lincoln  answered,  "  No,  —  if  that  slate  is 
broken  again,  it  will  be  at  the  top."  This  was 
where  Seward's  name  stood. 

There  can  be  but  little  doubt  that  this  speech 
of  the  President  was  at  once  reported  to  Sew- 
ard,  and  that  it  had  much  t'o  do  with  the  abrupt 
manner  in  which  on  the  2d  of  March  he  wrote 
to  Mr.  Lincoln,  thanking  him  for  his  kindness 
and  confidence,  but  declining  the  office  of  secre 
tary  of  state.  The  other  considerations  inducing 
him  to  this  course,  and  of  which  he  speaks  in 
his  letter  of  March  8th,  presently  to  be  quoted, 
may  have  been  in  his  mind  for  some  time ;  but 
they  had  not  moved  him  to  any  definite  action. 
Something  of  a  different  nature  must  have  sud- 


248  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

denly  come  to  his  knowledge,  which  caused  him 
within  forty-eight  hours  before  the  inauguration 
to  write  to  Mr.  Lincoln,  withdrawing  his  pre 
vious  acceptance  of  the  first  place  in  the  cabinet. 
His  short  note  bears  quite  as  strong  marks  of 
wounded  feelings  as  of  changed  convictions. 
The  coldness  of  its  tone  is  in  marked  contrast 
with  that  of  his  other  letters  to  the  President. 

WASHINGTON,  March  2,  1861. 

MY  DEAR  SIR  :  —  Circumstances  which  have 
occurred  since  I  expressed  to  you  in  December 
last  my  willingness  to  accept  the  office  of  secre 
tary  of  state  seem  to  me  to  render  it  my  duty 
to  ask  leave  to  withdraw  that  consent. 

Tendering  to  you  my  best  wishes  for  the  suc 
cess  of  your  administration,  with  my  sincere  and 
grateful  acknowledgments  of  all  your  acts  of 
kindness  and  confidence  towards  me,  I  remain 
very  respectfully  and  sincerely, 

Your  obedient  servant, 

WILLIAM  H.  SEWARD. 

The  Hon.  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN,  President-elect. 

Lincoln  got  this  note  on  Saturday,  and  on 
Monday,  inauguration  day,  handed  his  answer 
to  his  secretary,  saying  that  he  "could  not 
afford  to  let  Seward  take  the  first  trick."  This 
mode  of  speech,  with  which  the  country  after- 


THE    CABINET.  249 

wards  became  familiar,  seemed  at  the  time  more 
undignified  and  offensive  than  pithy  and  ex 
pressive;  and  many  persons  found  it,  in  the 
President  of  the  United  States,  as  unpleasant 
as  it  was  novel.  As  Seward  did  not  persist  in 
his  refusal,  one  may  be  quite  sure  that  the  dis 
creet  secretary  did  not  repeat  to  him  the  remark 
with  which  the  President  accompanied  the  de 
livery  of  the  note.  Seward  was  not  considering 
the  administration  as  a  game  in  which  he  was 
trying  to  take  the  first  or  any  other  trick ;  nor 
did  he  wish  his  name  on  a  slate  which  the  Presi 
dent  had  any  inclination  to  break ;  he  was  not 
so  hungry  for  place  that  he  would  submit  to  any 
indignities,  if  he  might  thereby  enjoy  either  the 
honors  or  emoluments  of  office ;  he  was  under 
no  obligations  to  Lincoln  to  accept  any  appoint 
ment.  The  obligation,  if  there  were  any,  was 
the  other  way :  Lincoln  had  taken  from  Seward 
the  first  trick  at  Chicago,  and  Seward  had  done 
his  best  to  enable  him  to  win  the  game  in  the 
country.  He  went  into  the  cabinet  from  no  mo 
tive  less  noble  than  the  desire  to  perform  for  his 
country  the  best  public  service  he  could.  He 
might  not  unreasonably  have  hesitated  about 
becoming  a  member  of  an  administration  com- 

O 

posed  of  such  discordant  and  heterogeneous  ma 
terials  as  Mr.  Lincoln  had  got  together,  —  a 
cabinet  which  the  caustic  tongue  of  a  veteran 


250  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

Republican  described  as  "  an  assortment  of  rivals 
whom  he  had  appointed  out  of  courtesy  [Seward, 
Chase,  and  Cameron],  one  stump  speaker  from 
Indiana  [Caleb  Smith],  and  two  representatives 
of  the  Blair  family  [Mr.  Bates,  for  whom  Gen 
eral  Frank  Blair  was  said  to  be  responsible,  and 
Montgomery  Blair]." 

After  the  inauguration  Lincoln  had  a  long 
talk  with  Seward,  who  at  last  agreed  to  take 
office,  and  on  the  following  day  was  nominated 
and  confirmed  as  secretary  of  state. 

In  writing  home  at  this  time  (March  8, 1861), 
Seward  says :  "  The  President  is  determined  that 
he  will  have  a  compound  cabinet;  and  that  it 
shall  be  peaceful,  and  even  permanent.  I  was 
at  one  time  on  the  point  of  refusing — nay,  I  did 
refuse  —  to  hazard  myself  in  the  experiment. 
But  a.  distracted  country  appeared  before  me, 
and  I  withdrew  from  that  position." 

The  cabinet,  as  finally  constituted,  consisted 
of  Chase,  Welles,  Cameron,  and  Blair,  Dem 
ocrats;  Seward,  Bates,  and  Smith,  Whigs. 
Some  of  these  have  already  been  spoken  of,  and 
of  others  there  is  no  occasion  to  speak.  The 
attorney  -  general,  Edward  Bates  of  Missouri, 
was  known  as  a  gentleman  of  spotless  reputa 
tion,  as  an  old  conservative  Whig  of  distinct 
anti-slavery  opinions  in  a  state  where  the  hold 
ing  of  such  views  was  as  courageous  as  it  was 


THE    CABINET.  251 

rare,  as  a  man  who  avoided  rather  than  sought 
office,  and  as  a  respectable  rather  than  an  emi 
nent  lawyer.  Mr,  Welles  was  a  Democrat  from 
Connecticut.  If  he  had  any  position  or  promi 
nence  in  his  party,  it  was  practically  confined  to 
his  own  state  ;  he  was  not  known  throughout 
New  England,  of  which  section  he  was  the  repre 
sentative  in  the  cabinet.  He  had  been  a  news 
paper  editor,  and  held  a  facile  pen,  had  been 
in  one  of  the  departments  at  Washington,  and 
postmaster  at  Hartford ;  but  he  brought  to  the 
cabinet  neither  increased  strength  within,  nor 
additional  support  from  without.  The  vigorous 
and  successful  administration  of  the  navy  dur 
ing  the  war  was  substantially  due  to  the  energy 
and  executive  ability  of  Captain  G.  V.  Fox,  the 
assistant  secretary  in  that  department 

Lincoln,  in  entering  upon  the  duties  of  his 
office,  was  confronted  by  problems  as  appalling 
and  perplexing  as  any  government  was  ever 
called  upon  to  face.  The  seven  states  which 
had  undertaken  to  secede  and  break  up  the 
Union  had  formed  their  new  Confederacy.  In 
the  month  before  Lincoln's  inauguration  they 
had  elected  a  President,  and  adopted  a  consti 
tution,  whose  fundamental  difference  from  that 
of  the  United  States  was  in  its  provision  for 
the  most  "  ample  and  avowed  protection  to  prop 
erty  in  slaves."  Their  government  was  com- 


252  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

plete  on  paper  ;  the  machinery  of  their  state 
governments  was  the  same  as  before  the  seces 
sion  ordinances  were  passed,  was  in  the  hands 
of  the  same  officers,  and  running  on  without 
change.  They  had  banished  the  sovereignty  of 
the  United  States  from  all  places  within  their 
jurisdiction,  except  the  two  forts  already  spoken 
of  ;  the  safety  of  which,  insufficiently  garrisoned 
and  provisioned  as  they  were,  must  be  at  once 
provided  for  by  the  administration,  unless  they 
were  to  be  abandoned. 

On  the  morning  after  the  inauguration,  be 
fore  any  member  of  the  cabinet  had  assumed 
the  duties  of  office,  the  War  Department  com 
municated  to  the  President  information  just  re 
ceived  from  Major  Anderson  at  Sumter,  stat 
ing  that  he  had  only  a  month's  provisions,  that 
newly  erected  hostile  batteries  commanded  his 
position,  that  the  channels  and  harbor  had  been 
obstructed,  that  patrol  boats  and  other  Con 
federate  vessels  guarded  the  approaches  to  his 
post  and  watched  his  every  movement ;  and 
that  it  would  take  twenty  thousand  men  to  re 
lieve  and  hold  the  fort.  General  Scott  and 
the  other  army  officers  confirmed  this  opinion. 
The  relief  of  Fort  Pickens  was  a  much  simpler 
affair,  if  it  were  only  done  promptly.  But  an 
expedition  for  Sumter  on  the  scale  which  these 
officers  thought  requisite  to  insure  success  was 


FORT   SUMTER.  253 

simply  impossible.  The  President  had  at  his 
disposal  110  forces  adequate  for  such  an  under 
taking.  A  vague  direction  to  General  Scott  by 
word  of  mouth,  that  he  was  "  to  exercise  all  pos 
sible  vigilance  for  the  maintenance  of  all  mili 
tary  posts,  and  to  call  upon  the  departments  for 
the  means  necessary  for  this  purpose,"  and  a 
request  to  him  to  reconsider  carefully  the  mat 
ter  of  the  relief  of  Sumter,  were  all  that  could 
be  done  for  the  moment.  Four  days  later  the 
whole  matter  was  laid  before  the  cabinet,  and 
on  several  days  following  there  were  consulta 
tions  with  officers  of  the  navy  as  well  as  of  the 
army.  The  latter  adhered  to  their  opinion  as 
to  the  force  required  to  succor  and  hold  Sum 
ter  ;  the  former  thought  that  a  small  expedition 
of  light-draft  steamers  might  successfully  carry 
supplies.  The  President  hesitated.  He  took 
from  General  Scott  an  order  for  the  evacuation 
of  the  fort,  but  did  not  sign  it ;  and  on  the 
15th  of  March  he  called  upon  the  members  of 
his  cabinet  to  give  him  in  writing  their  opin 
ions,  whether,  if  it  were  possible  to  provision 
Sumter,  it  would  be  wise  to  attempt  to  do  so. 
The  form  of  the  question  showed  that  it  was  the 
political  rather  than  the  military  problem  which 
the  President  submitted  to  their  consideration. 

Only  two  members  of  the  cabinet,  Chase  and 
Blair,   favored    the    attempt   to    provision   the 


254  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

fort,  assuming  it  to  be  possible  to  do  so.  The 
other  five,  Seward,  Bates,  Cameron,  Welles, 
and  Smith,  were  opposed  to  it.  Seward  in  his 
answer  assumed  that  "the  government  was  to 
maintain,  preserve,  and  defend  the  Union,  peace 
fully,  if  it  could,  forcibly,  if  it  must,  to  every 
extremity."  It  was  by  our  standing  on  the  de 
fensive,  he  thought,  that  the  border  states  had  so 
far  been  kept  loyal,  and  a  perseverance  in  this 
policy  was  in  his  opinion  the  only  means  of  assur 
ing  their  continuing  so.  He  expressed  his  fear 
that  with  a  daily  press,  daily  mails,  and  incessant 
telegraph,  the  design  to  supply  the  fort  would 
become  known  in  Charleston  as  soon  as  prepa 
rations  should  begin,  and  the  garrison  fall  by  as 
sault  before  the  expedition  could  reach  the  harbor. 
To  obtain  more  certain  and^efinite  informa 
tion  both  as  to  the  condition  of  Sumter  and  the 
existence  of  any  Union  feeling  in  South  Caro 
lina,  the  President  dispatched  to  Charleston 
Captain  Fox,  the  author  of  the  relief  plan  pro 
posed  by  the  navy,  and  two  other  gentlemen. 
Returning  before  the  end  of  the  month  they 
reported  that  there  was  but  one  Union  man  in 
Charleston  ;  and  while  Captain  Fox  was  more 
confident  than  ever  of  the  success  of  his  plan, 
he  had  been  unable  to  convince  either  his  com 
panion,  who  visited  the  fort,  or  Major  Ander- 
son,  that  it  was  in  any  way  a  feasible  one. 


FORT   SUMTER.  255 

Just  after  their  return  Lincoln  received  from 
General  Scott  a  memorandum,  advising  the 
abandonment  of  Fort  Pickens,  as  a  measure  of 
conciliation  which  would  soothe  the  eight  re 
maining  slave  states,  and  render  perpetual  their 
cordial  adherence  to  the  Union.  A  cabinet 
meeting  was  called,  and  with  this  memorandum 
and  all  the  other  information  before  them,  the 
members  of  the  cabinet  gave  the  President  their 
written  opinions  as  to  both  forts.  Of  the  seven 
members  of  the  cabinet  who,  a  fortnight  before, 
had  answered  his  question  as  to  Sumter,  Blair 
had  been  then  the  only  advocate  of  the  plan  for 
its  relief,  of  which  his  brother-in-law,  Captain 
Fox,  was  the  author ;  though  Chase  had  doubt 
fully  answered  that  the  fort  should  be  relieved 
.if  possible.  But  now,  when  the  situation  of  both 
forts  was  considered  (only  six  members  of  the 
cabinet  being  present),  Chase  and  Welles  joined 
with  Blair;  Bates  thought  Sumter  should  be 
"  either  provisioned  or  evacuated,"  and  they  all, 
except  Blair,  were  of  opinion  that  Pickens  should 
be  reinforced.  Having  heard  the  views  of  his 
constitutional  advisers,  the  President  determined 
to  attempt  the  relief  of  Sumter  ;  and,  as  he  was 
uneasy  at  the  want  of  news  from  Fort  Pickens, 
to  which  he  had  previously  dispatched  a  steamer, 
he  resolved  to  send  other  vessels  there  also.  The 
preparations  for  the  Sumter  expedition,  which 


256  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

were  made  through  the  Navy  Department  and 
followed  its  usual  routine,  were  more  or  less 
guessed  at  by  the  public  and  disclosed  in  the 
newspapers.  Notice  of  this  expedition  was  offi 
cially  communicated  to  the  governor  of  South 
Carolina  in  accordance  with  an  assurance  the 
President  had  previously  authorized  to  be  given, 
that  he  would  give  such  information,  if  it  should 
be  decided  to  provision  the  fort.  But  before 
this  notice  reached  Charleston,  two  telegrams 
had  already  made  the  plan  known ;  its  precise 
details  had  been  ascertained  by  the  treacherous 
rifling  of  Major  Anderson's  mail  bags.  The 
bombardment  began  before  the  first  vessel  of 
the  relief  expedition  had  reached  the  rendezvous 
off  Charleston  harbor ;  a  violent  storm  prevented 
the  arrival  of  the  tugs  which  were  essential  to 
success,  and  the  expedition  was  a  failure. 

Seward  has  been  criticised  for  detaching  and 
sending  to  Fort  Pickens  the  Powhatan,  which 
the  secretary  of  the  navy  had  ordered  on  the 
Sumter  expedition.  But  Seward's  responsibil 
ity  in  the  matter,  if  any  at  all,  is  very  slight. 
Captain  Fox  asked  for  the  Pocahontas  for 
Sumter,  and  the  President  ordered  her  to  be 
given  him.  Mr.  Welles  substituted  the  Pow 
hatan.  The  President,  knowing  nothing  of 
this  change,  gave  to  the  officer  in  charge  of 
the  Pickens  expedition  a  direct  order  for  the 


FORT   SUMTER.  257 

Powhatan,  and  lie  carried  her  off.  The  loss  of 
this  vessel  did  not  in  fact  have  anything  to  do 
with  the  failure  of  the  Sumter  expedition,  the 
causes  of  which  have  been  already  stated. 

The  Fort  Pickens  expedition  succeeded,  and 
gave  us  during  the  war  the  control  of  that  fort, 
of  Key  West,  and  of  the  Dry  Tortugas.  This 
expedition  was  fitted  out  under  the  direct  orders 
of  the  President  without  the  knowledge  of  the 
Navy  Department,  and  the  secret  was  kept  so 
perfectly  that  the  first  actual  knowledge  of  it 
was  derived  from  the  report  of  the  commander 
on  his  return.  This  mode  of  proceeding  was,  of 
course,  all  wrong  and  irregular,  but  secrecy  was 
vital  to  success,  and  it  may  well  be  doubted 
whether  in  the  then  existing  condition  of  affairs 
secrecy  would  have  been  possible  had  the  Navy 
Department  directed  or  even  been  cognizant  of 
the  preparations. 

The  Surnter  expedition  failed  of  its  ostensible 
object,  but  it  brought  about  the  Southern  attack 
on  that  fort.  The  first  gun  fired  there  effectually 
cleared  the  air,  put  an  end  to  discussions  and 
differences  of  opinion,  and  placed  Lincoln  at  the 
head  of  a  united  people,  resolved,  at  whatever 
cost,  to  maintain  the  integrity  of  their  country. 
There  were  no  more  doubts  or  hesitations.  The 
border  states  chose  their  sides.  The  struggle 
had  begun. 


XIV. 

JUSTICE    CAMPBELL    AND    THE    REBEL    COMMIS 
SIONERS. 

AT  the  time  of  Lincoln's  inauguration  there 
were  in  Washington  commissioners  accredited 
by  the  "  Confederate  States  of  America  "  to  the 
government  of  the  United  States  as  a  foreign 
power,  and  instructed  to  open  negotiations  "  with 
a  view  to  the  recognition  of  the  independence  of 
the  Confederacy  and  the  concluding  of  treaties 
of  amity  and  good  will  between  the  two  na 
tions."  So  far  as  its  avowed  objects  were  con 
cerned  their  mission  was  wholly  fruitless.  They 
never  saw  or  had  any  communication  with  the 
President  or  any  member  of  his  cabinet.  They 
lingered  in  Washington  for  their  own  purposes, 
until  on  the  8th  of  April  they  took  from  the 
State  Department  a  copy  of  a  memorandum 
which  Seward,  unwilling  to  give  them  even  such 
recognition  as  is  implied  by  the  writing  of  a 
letter,  had  filed  there  on  the  15th  of  March,  and 
which  they  knew  had  been  waiting  for  them 
since  that  time.  In  this  memorandum  he  dis 
tinctly  but  civilly  declined  to  receive  them,  and 


THE   REBEL    COMMISSIONERS.  259 

gave  some  reasons  for  so  doing.  As  they  assumed 
to  be  foreign  ambassadors,  they  should  have 
addressed  themselves  in  the  first  instance  to  the 
secretary  of  state;  but,  feeling  doubts  as  to 
their  reception,  they  induced  a  senator  from  a 
border  state  that  had  not  yet  seceded,  to  ask  if 
the  secretary  would  see  them  informally ;  when 
Seward  declined  to  do  this,  they  sent  a  formal 
application,  with  the  final  result  that  has  just 
been  stated.  This  is  the  whole  story  of  these 
commissioners,  so  far  as  the  nominal  and  de 
clared  object  of  their  appointment  is  concerned ; 
but  Southern  historians  have  accused  the  govern 
ment  of  having  adopted  "  a  policy  of  perfidy  " 
toward  them,  and  Judge  John  A.  Campbell,  of 
Alabama,  —  who  still  retained  his  place  on  the 
Supreme  Court,  although  he  was  in  fact  the  in 
termediary  of  the  Southern  commissioners  and 
Confederate  authorities,  —  has  devoted  much 
labor  to  an  attempt  to  prove  that  Mr.  Seward 
in  his  intercourse  with  him  was  guilty  of  du 
plicity  and  equivocation. 

Judge  Campbell's  intervention  began  in  this 
way.  When  Seward  had  written  the  memoran 
dum  which  has  been  spoken  of,  declining  to 
receive  the  commissioners,  he  directed  a  copy 
of  it  to  be  prepared  and  given  them;  but  be 
fore  this  had  been  done  two  justices  of  the 
Supreme  Court,  Nelson  of  New  York,  an  old  ac- 


260  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

quaintance  and  almost  neighbor  of  Seward,  and 
Campbell  of  Alabama  called  upon  him  together. 
Campbell,  it  is  said,  had  his  resignation  already 
prepared  and  was  to  have  sent  it  in  on  that  very 
day  (March  15,  1861).1  Instead  of  doing  this, 
however,  he  had  determined  to  withhold  it  for 
a  time,  that,  as  he  wrote  Jefferson  Davis,  he 
might  avail  himself  of  his  position  to  give  him 
access  to  the  administration,  which  he  could 
not  otherwise  have.2  He  probably  thought  the 
breaking  up  of  the  Union  a  mistake,  and  was 
therefore  not  a  disunionist ;  but  he  was  a  states- 
rights  Southern  Democrat,  who  believed  that  his 
state  had  a  claim  on  him  paramount  to  any  obli 
gation  which  he  owed  to  the  United  States  gov 
ernment,  whose  sworn  officer  he  was.  Alabama 
had  seceded,  and  he  meant  to  follow  her.  He 
also  believed,  however,  that  if  the  United  States 
were  to  abandon  Sumter  and  Pickens  and  let 
the  Confederacy  go  its  way  unmolested,  war 
might  be  avoided,  and  a  more  satisfactory  con 
clusion  of  the  questions  between  the  two  "  gov 
ernments  "  be  speedily  reached.  Seward  knew 
nothing  of  this.  He  only  knew  that  Campbell 
was  a  judge  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United 
States ;  and  if  he  had  harbored  any  suspicions 
as  to  his  loyalty,  or  had  felt  the  need  of  any 

1  Stanton  to  Buchanan,  March  10,  1861. 

2  April  3,  1861. 


THE   REBEL    COMMISSIONERS.  261 

assurance  of  this  beyond  the  guaranty  of  his 
official  position,  any  such  doubts  would  have 
been  dispelled,  and  every  requisite  assurance 
given,  by  his  coming  as  the  companion  of  Judge 
Nelson,  whose  support  of  the  government  was 
absolutely  unquestioned. 

Seward,  Nelson,  and  Campbell  each  wished 
to  preserve  the  existing  condition  of  things,  and 
to  postpone  as  long  as  possible  any  outbreak,  in 
the  hope  that  a  resort  to  force  might  be  at  last 
avoided.  Their  reasons  for  wishing  so  and  the 
objects  they  had  in  view  were,  however,  quite 
different.  Seward's  position  and  hopes  were 
well  known.  He  thought  that  if  any  clash  of 
arms  could  be  postponed  until  the  border  states 
should  realize  the  scrupulous  care  with  which 
Lincoln  would  respect  and  maintain  the  just 
rights  of  the  South,  they  would  remain  loyal, 
and  that  secession,  confined  to  the  seaboard 
and  gulf  states,  would  fail  from  its  own  weak 
ness.  Nelson  dreaded  a  war,  was  more  doubt 
ful  as  to  the  legality  of  some  coercive  measures 
which  it  was  rumored  that  the  government  might 
adopt,  and  feared  that,  should  there  be  a  resort 
to  arms,  our  constitutional  government  might 
perish  in  the  struggle.  As  to  Campbell's  posi 
tion,  perhaps  enough  has  been  already  said. 
He  considered  the  Confederacy  an  established 
fact ;  but  he  knew  that  peace  was  very  important 


262  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

for  the  new  government,  and  he  was  willing  to 
work  for  it  in  the  interests  and  as  the  inter 
mediary  of  Jefferson  Davis  and  his  cabinet.1 
Whether  Campbell  had  seen  the  commissioners 
before  calling  on  Seward  seems  uncertain.  His 
visit  with  Judge  Nelson  was  made  for  the  pur 
pose  of  inducing  Seward  to  reconsider  the  mat 
ter,  and  to  write  to  the  commissioners,  stating 
the  desire  of  the  government  for  a  friendly  ad 
justment,  and  saying  that  "  every  effort  would 
be  made  and  every  forbearance  exercised  before 
resorting  to  extreme  measures."  This  Seward 
declined  to  do,  and  told  the  judges  that  the  cab 
inet  would  never  assent  to  it.  On  Seward's 
part  the  conversation  was  frank  and  friendly; 
but,  considering  that  Judge  Campbell  was  a 
Southerner  from  a  seceded  state,  it  was  unwise 
and  indiscreet.  That  there  was  any  difference 
between  Campbell's  relations  and  feeling  towards 
the  government  and  those  of  Judge  Nelson, 
seems  not  to  have  occurred  to  Seward  at  the 
time;  certainly  no  suspicion  ever  crossed  his- 
mind  that  Campbell  was  in  fact  a  secessionist 
going  out  with  his  state,  but  lingering  in  Wash 
ington  and  keeping  his  place,  that  he  might 
better  serve  the  interests  of  the  rebel  authorities. 
It  had  already  been  announced  half  officially 
in  the  newspapers  that  Sumter  was  to  be  evacu- 

1  Davis's  Message,  May  8,  1861. 


THE   REBEL    COMMISSIONERS.  263 

ated ; 1  and  Campbell  asked  Seward  point-blank 
if  this  was  so.  Campbell  says  that  Seward  re 
plied  that  Sumter  would  be  evacuated  within 
five  days.  Leaving  Seward,  Campbell  went  at 
once  to  the  rebel  commissioners  and  reported  to 
them  the  result  of  his  conversation.  He  urged 
them  to  give  a  reasonable  delay  before  demand 
ing  an  answer  to  their  request  for  an  interview, 
telling  them  that,  if  they  pressed  for  it  at  once, 
they  would  receive  a  civil  but  firm  refusal.  As 
to  Fort  Sumter,  he  said  he  felt  perfectly  con 
fident  it  would  be  evacuated  within  five  days. 
The  commissioners  were  not  quite  open  with 
Campbell ;  he  found  them  apparently  impatient 
of  delay;  they  seemed  to  yield  to  his  wishes 
reluctantly,  and  only  after  they  had  satisfied 
themselves  that  all  his  information  had  come 
from  Seward ;  they  required  him  to  put  his 
statement  as  to  Sumter  in  writing  and  to  sign 
it.  Their  reluctance,  however,  was  more  appar 
ent  than  real.  Their  secret  instructions  were  to 
"  play  with  Seward  and  gain  time,"  until  the 
South  was  ready.  They  meant  to  make  a  per 
emptory  demand  for  their  reception  or  rejection 
on  the  very  first  day  that  Jefferson  Davis  and 
his  cabinet  were  ready  to  meet  the  consequences ; 
but  not  till  then,  if  they  could  avoid  it.  Camp- 

1  New  York  Herald,  March  10.    National  Republican,  March 
12,  1861. 


264  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

bell's  intervention  gave  them  just  the  excuse  they 
desired.  It  enabled  them  to  stay  in  Washing 
ton  and  pick  up  such  crumbs  of  information 
and  gossip  as  could  be  found  in  the  corridors 
of  the  hotels  or  in  other  places  accessible  to 
them,  and  to  secure  time  for  the  Confederacy  to 
make  the  necessary  arrangements  for  the  public 
defense.  Their  course  was  approved,  and  they 
were  instructed  to  make  no  formal  demand  for 
an  answer  so  long  as  the  United  States  contin 
ued  its  hesitating,  uncertain,  and  vacillating 
policy. 

After  seeing  the  commissioners,  Campbell 
the  same  evening  (March  15)  wrote  to  Jefferson 
Davis  :  "  Before  this  reaches  you  Sumter  will 
have  been  evacuated,  or  orders  will  have  been 
issued  for  the  purpose."  This  he  says  that 
Seward  authorized  him  to  do  ;  he  also  says  that 
he  sent  to  Seward  the  same  evening  the  substance 
of  the  memorandum  which  he  had  given  to  the 
commissioners.  The  memorandum  and  his  state 
ment  as  to  that  are  to  be  found  in  his  letter  to 
Seward  of  April  13,  1861.  The  statement  that 
Seward  authorized  what  he  wrote  to  Davis  was 
never  made  public  until  after  Seward's  death. 

The  conversation,  memorandum,  and  letter  to 
Davis  are  all  to  be  referred  to  the  same  day 
(March  15),  the  very  day  of  the  decisive  vote  in 
the  cabinet  (five  to  two)  against  holding  Sum- 


THE   REBEL    COMMISSIONERS.  265 

ter ;  when  Lincoln  had  already  in  his  possession 
the  order  for  its  evacuation,  which  only  needed 
his  signature.  Seward,  therefore,  had  not  the 
slightest  doubt  that  the  matter  was  settled.  He 
communicated  to  his  visitors  the  confidence  he 
himself  felt.  It  was  an  unguarded  statement  on 
his  part,  yet  not  fairly  subject  to  any  severe 
criticism.  What  Judge  Campbell  stated,  on  the 
faith  of  what  he  heard  from  Seward,  he  might 
almost  equally  well  have  said  upon  the  faith  of 
what  is  admitted  to  have  been  the  almost  official 
utterance  of  the  government  organ  ;  his  attempt 
to  torture  Seward's  statement  into  a  promise 
and  to  charge  him  with  duplicity  in  not  carrying 
it  out  wrests  the  words  from  their  natural  mean 
ing  and  from  the  sense  in  which  the  judge  un 
derstood  them  at  the  time.  He  knew  perfectly 
well  that  it  was  not  in  Mr.  Seward's  power  to 
carry  out  any  policy  or  to  control  the  situation 
in  any  way  ;  that  all  that  he  could  do,  and  all 
that  he  was  doing,  was  to  communicate  to  him 
a  conclusion,  which  he  understood  to  have  been 
reached  at  the  time,  but  which  at  any  moment 
before  it  was  acted  upon  might  be  reversed, 
against  his  own  judgment  and  contrary  to  his 
expectation,  as  in  this  case  it  actually  was. 
Moreover,  Judge  Campbell  seems  to  forget,  — 
when  he  speaks  of  this  statement  as  a  promise, 
and  charges  Seward  with  bad  faith  in  not  ful- 


2G6  WILLIAM  IIENRY  SEWARD. 

filling  it,  —  that  a  promise  necessarily  implies 
two  parties  who  are  on  opposite  sides,  and  that 
in  charging  the  secretary  with  bad  faith  he  as 
sumes  not  merely  that  he  himself  was,  as  after 
wards  appeared,  a  rebel  emissary,  but  that  he 
was  then  known  as  such  to  Mr.  Seward ;  whereas 
just  the  reverse  is  true.  It  had  never  occurred 
to  the  secretary  that  he  might  find  under  the 
robes  of  a  United  States  judge  an  emissary  of 
Jefferson  Davis.  The  two  judges  who  were 
present  at  this  interview  on  the  15th  of  March 
seemed  to  have  come  on  the  same  errand  and 
were  presumed  to  be  in  the  same  position. 
Mr.  Seward's  conversation  was  with  both  alike ; 
whatever  he  said  was  said  to  both  ;  whatever  as 
surances  or  promises  he  made  were  given  to  one 
just  as  much  as  to  the  other ;  if  he  was  guilty 
of  any  bad  faith,  he  was  equally  so  to  both 
judges.  Judge  Nelson  approved  Judge  Camp 
bell's  memorandum  which  has  been  quoted,  but 
we  have  yet  to  learn  that  he  ever  gave  to  Camp 
bell's  charges  against  Seward  any  countenance 
or  endorsement. 

When  five  days  had  gone  by,  Campbell,  whose 
true  relations,  if  there  was  still  any  shadow  of 
doubt  about  them,  were  thus  made  absolutely 
clear,  requested  the  rebel  commissioners  to  tele 
graph  Beauregard  at  Charleston  and  ascertain 
what  had  been  done  as  to  vacating  Sumter. 


THE   REBEL    COMMISSIONERS.  267 

Beauregard  answered  that  there  had  been  no 
change  ;  and  thereupon  Judge  Campbell,  taking 
Judge  Nelson  with  him,  went  twice  to  see  Mr. 
Seward  (March  21  and  22)  and  on  the  same 
days  wrote  for  the  commissioners  two  memo 
randa  giving  the  results  of  these  interviews.  In 
the  first  he  says  that  his  confidence  in  the  evacu 
ation  of  Sumter  is  unabated  ;  in  the  last,  that 
of  March  22d,  he  repeats  this  statement,  and 
adds,  "  /  shall  have  knowledge  of  any  change, 
in  the  existing  status"  1  At  this  point  Judge 
Nelson  withdrew  from  further  connection  with 
the  matter ;  he  had  probably  begun  to  suspect 
Campbell's  real  relation  to  the  Confederate  au 
thorities,  and  was  afraid  of  being  drawn  into 
a  false  position  by  continuing  to  follow  him 
further.  Here  it  becomes  important  as  well 
as  interesting  to  note  the  difference  in  Judge 
Campbell's  language  when  he  speaks  of  a 
promise  actually  made  him,  and  that  which  he 
had  used  in  stating  his  own  conclusions  from 
what  had  been  said  in  conversation.  He  does 
not  say  now  that  he  is  convinced  he  shall  have 
knowledge  of  any  change ;  he  asserts  positively, 

1  In  his  letter  of  April  13  to  Mr.  Seward  Judge  Campbell 
attempts  to  paraphrase  this  sentence  so  as  to  restrict  it,  and 
make  it  mean  that  as  regards  Fort  Pickens  he  was  to  "  have 
notice  of  any  design  to  alter  the  existing  status  there."  This 
is  not  so  in  the  original  memorandum,  and  this  construction 
is  not  warranted  hy  the  context  there. 


268  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

"  I  shall  have  knowledge  of  any  change  in  the 
existing  status."  This  new  mode  of  expression 
was  not  accidental ;  it  corresponded  to  the  new 
situation.  He  now  for  the  first  time  had  a 
promise,  which  Seward  had  been  authorized  by 
the  President  to  make,  and  the  difference  in 
his  phraseology  only  repeated  the  difference  in 
Seward's.  The  President  had  been  informed 
by  Seward  of  his  conversation  with  Nelson  and 
Campbell  on  the  15th  of  March.  He  had 
weighed  the  matter  deliberately,  and  Seward's 
statement  to  Campbell  on  the  22d,  that  he 
should  "  have  knowledge  of  any  change  in  the 
existing  status,"  embodied,  as  Mr.  Lincoln's 
biographers  tell  us,  the  conclusion  which  the 
President  himself  had  reached  and  which  he 
had  authorized  Mr.  Seward  to  communicate  to 
Judge  Campbell. 

The  President  was  at  this  time  deeply  consid 
ering  his  duty  with  reference  to  the  whole  situ 
ation  and  especially  as  to  Sumter.  He  had  said 
in  his  inaugural  address  :  "  The  power  confided 
to  me  will  be  used  to  hold,  occupy,  and  possess 
the  property  and  places  belonging  to  the  govern 
ment."  It  might  be  true  that  it  would  require 
a  force  greater  than  he  could  command  to  hold 
Sumter  against  a  hostile  attack;  and  that  to 
send  any  reinforcements  thither  might  provoke 
an  attack ;  the  garrison  already  there  was  quite 


THE   REBEL    COMMISSIONERS.  269 

sufficient  for  a  time  of  peace  ;  but  its  provisions 
were  nearly  exhausted.  Should  he  undertake  to 
throw  in  fresh  supplies  by  sea,  following  a  plan 
which  naval  officers  assured  him  was  practica 
ble  ;  or  should  he,  notwithstanding  his  public 
declarations,  withdraw  the  troops,  and  evacuate 
the  fort  without  making  a  single  effort  to  supply 
the  needed  provisions? 

To  determine  this  matter  to  his  own  satisfac 
tion,  the  President  felt  that  he  must  have  fur 
ther  and  more  accurate  information,  and  to  ob 
tain  this  he  sent  to  Charleston,  as  has  already 
appeared,  three  gentlemen  on  whose  judgment 
he  thought  he  could  rely.  One  of  them,  Mar 
shal  Lamon,  besides  visiting  the  fort  and  see 
ing  Major  Anderson,  had  an  interview  with 
Governor  Pickens,  in  which  he  made  such  in 
quiries  as  to  the  best  mode  of  removing  the 
garrison,  and  whether  they  would  be  permitted 
to  depart  in  peace,  that  the  governor  fancied 
the  evacuation  definitely  determined  on,  and  was 
constantly  expecting  to  see  signs  of  preparation 
for  it.  Becoming  impatient  after  a  few  days, 
he  wrote  to  Beauregard,  whom  the  Confederate 
authorities  had  sent  to  command  at  Charleston  : 
"  If  Lamon  was  authorized  to  arrange  matters, 
Anderson  ought  now  to  say  so."  Failing  to 
learn  anything  through  Beauregard's  inquiries, 
the  governor,  on  the  30th  of  March,  telegraphed 


270  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

to  the  Confederate  commissioners  at  Washing 
ton.  They  sent  at  once  for  their  intermediary, 
who  carried  the  dispatch  to  Seward  on  Saturday 
afternoon  and  left  it,  saying  that  he  would 
return  on  Monday.  When  they  met  011  that 
day,  Campbell,  after  some  unimportant  talk, 
asked  Seward  what  he  might  say  to  Governor 
Pickens  on  the  subject  of  Sumter.  Seward 
wrote  :  "  The  President  may  desire  to  supply 
Fort  Sumter,  but  will  not  undertake  to  do  so 
without  first  giving  notice  to  Governor  Pickens," 
and  handed  this  to  Campbell.  According  to  a 
more  detailed  narrative  of  this  interview  given 
by  Campbell  (from  whom,  it  should  be  ob 
served,  our  only  accounts  of  all  these  interviews 
come),  Seward,  in  reply  to  a  further  question, 
stated  that  he  did  not  believe  the  attempt  to 
throw  in  supplies  would  be  made,  and  that  there 
was  no  design  to  reinforce  the  fort.  To  which 
Campbell  answered  that  he  had  that  assurance 
previously,  and  added,  that  it  was  difficult  to 
restrain  South  Carolina  already,  and  that  he 
"  would  not  recommend  an  answer  that  did  not 
express  the  purpose  of  the  government."  There 
upon  Seward  went  out,  saying  he  must  see  the 
President ;  and  returning  presently,  modified  the 
memorandum  so  that  it  read,  "  I  am  satisfied 
the  government  will  not  undertake  to  supply 
Fort  Sumter  without  giving  notice  to  Governor 


THE   REBEL    COM^fISS10NERS.  271 

Pickens." 1  With  this,  as  the  definitive  reply 
to  his  inquiry  as  to  what  he  "might  say  to 
Governor  Pickens,"  Campbell  departed ;  and 
the  interviews  between  him  and  Seward  were 
brought  to  an  end.  If  there  is  any  substan 
tial  difference  between  the  two  papers  written 
by  Seward  at  this  time,  it  is,  that  the  probabil 
ity  of  an  attempt  to  provision  the  fort  is  more 
strongly  suggested  by  the  second,  which  Camp 
bell  carried  off,  than  by  the  first.  A  person 
comparing  the  two,  and  considering  the  change 
of  phraseology,  might  naturally  find  the  expla 
nation  of  it  in  a  more  than  half-formed,  though 
not  fully  ripe  purpose  in  the  President,  by  whom 
the  alteration  had  evidently  been  made,  to  en 
deavor  to  supply  the  garrison  of  Sumter. 

The  day  before  Campbell  went  to  Seward  with 
the  telegram  from  Governor  Pickens  the  cabi 
net  had  held  its  second  meeting  as  to  Sumter. 
At  this  meeting  Chase,  Welles,  and  Blair  had 
given  their  opinions  in  favor  of  relieving  the 
fort,  by  force  if  necessary,  and  Bates  had  stated 
his  conclusion  that  the  time  had  come  either  to 
evacuate  or  to  relieve  it,  while  Seward  and  Smith 
thought  that  it  should  be  abandoned.  The  Pres 
ident  had  given  no  definite  orders  for  an  expe 
dition  to  Sumter,  though  he  had  issued  some 
preparatory  directions,  which  were  probably 

1  Campbell  to  Seward,  April   13,  1861.     Reb.  Rec.  I.  Doc. 
p.  426. 


272  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

known  only  to  the  secretaries  of  war  and  of 
the  navy,  who  were  each  necessarily  cognizant 
of  them.  It  is  clear  from  his  letter  of  April 
1st  to  the  President,  which  is  presently  to  be 
spoken  of,  that  Seward  either  did  not  know 
them,  or  had  no  belief  that  they  would  lead  to 
any  consequences.  If  there  was  any  rumor  of 
these  preparations  in  Washington,  it  was  not 
sufficient  to  excite  serious  uneasiness  in  the  Con 
federate  commissioners  before  the  6th  of  April, 
the  day  on  which  the  President  gave  to  Captain 
Fox  his  final  orders  for  the  Sumter  expedition, 
and  sent  to  Charleston  a  confidential  messenger 
with  the  promised  notice  to  Governor  Pickens  of 
his  intention  to  provision  the  fort. 

By  the  morning  of  Sunday,  April  7th,  however, 
the  commissioners  had  become  so  disturbed  that 
they  again  invoked  Campbell's  assistance ;  he  at 
once  wrote  to  Seward  and  received  from  him  this 
brief  reply:  "Faith  as  to  Sumter  fully  kept; 
wait  and  see."  This  of  course  meant  that  notice 
had  been  given  to  the  governor,  as  agreed,  of 
the  attempt  to  provision  the  fort,  and  that 
Campbell,  if  he  would  only  wait,  would  see  this. 
It  is  evident  that  Campbell  at  the  time  so  under 
stood  it,  for  on  the  same  day,  after  receiving  this 
line  from  Seward,  he  wrote  the  commissioners, 
"  I  believe  that  my  assurances  to  you  that  the 
government  will  not  undertake  to  supply  Sumter 


THE   REBEL    COMMISSIONERS.  273 

without  notice  to  Governor  Pickens  will  be  fully 
sustained  by  the  event."  A  further  extract 
from  the  draft  of  a  letter  written  by  him  on  the 
same  day  will  show  that,  while  he  knew  and 
shared  the  common  opinion  in  Washington  as  to 
the  uncertainties  and  vacillations  of  the  admin 
istration,  he  also  anticipated  what  was  to  be  its 
ultimate  decision  as  to  Sumter.  He  says  :  "  Such 
government  by  blindman's-buff,  stumbling  along 
too  far,  will  end  by  the  general  overturn.  Fort 
Sumter,  I. fear,  is  a  case  past  arrangement." 

The  same  Sunday  evening  at  nine  o'clock 
the  commissioners'  secretary  called  at  Seward's 
house  to  ask  that  the  answer  to  their  request  for 
an  interview,  which  they  knew  had  been  waiting 
their  pleasure  at  the  State  Department  for  more 
than  three  weeks,  might  be  delivered  to  them  at 
two  o'clock  the  next  day.  This  was  done.  On 
the  9th  of  April,  they  sent  to  Mr.  Seward  a  reply, 
which  had  previously  been  submitted  to  Judge 
Campbell  and  modified  at  his  request,  and  on 
the  llth  they  left  Washington.  They  had 
gained  the  delay  which  they  were  instructed  to 
obtain.  If  their  hopes  of  a  peaceful  solution  of 
their  difficulties  by  the  administration's  aban 
donment  of  Sumter  and  Pickens  seem  to  have 
been  at  times  somewhat  too  sanguine,  and  their 
communications  to  the  Confederate  authorities 
too  rose-colored,  yet  their  telegram  of  March 


274  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

22d  — "  And,  what  is  of  infinite  importance 
to  us,  notice  will  be  given  of  any  change  in 
the  existing  status  "  —  shows  that  they  them 
selves  were  not  over-confident  of  the  fulfillment 
of  their  own  prophecies  of  evacuation  and  of 
peace.  Jefferson  Davis  and  his  cabinet  never 
put  any  faith  in  these.  On  the  1st  of  March  the 
Confederate  secretary  of  war  wrote  to  Beaure- 
gard  at  Charleston  :  "  Give  but  little  credit  to 
the  rumors  of  an  amicable  adjustment.  Do  not 
slacken  for  a  moment  your  energies ;  "  and  this 
represents  the  attitude  and  action  of  the  author 
ities  at  Montgomery  from  that  time  forward. 

The  news  of  the  bombardment  of  Sumter 
reached  Washington  on  the  12th  of  April ;  the 
next  day  Campbell  addressed  to  Seward  a  let 
ter  complaining  that  the  equivocating  conduct 
of  the  administration  was  the  proximate  cause 
of  this  great  calamity.  To  this  letter  Seward 
properly  made  no  reply.  A  week  later  Campbell 
inclosed  a  copy  of  it  in  another  communication, 
in  which  he  said  that  he  insisted  upon  an  expla 
nation,  adding  that  in  case  of  refusal  he  should 
not  hold  himself  debarred  from  placing  these 
letters  before  such  persons  as  were  entitled  to  an 
explanation  from  him.  This  letter  also  remained 
unanswered.  Shortly  afterwards  Campbell  gave 
his  own  version  of  the  whole  matter  to  Stanton, 
who  was  by  no  means  inclined  at  this  period  to 


THE   REBEL    COMMISSIONERS.  275 

a  favorable  opinion  of  the  administration  or  of 
Seward  ;  but  who,  after  hearing  Campbell's  whole 
story,  wrote  to  Buchanan  that  he  did  not  believe 
any  deceit  or  double  dealing  could  be  justly 
imputed  to  Seward,  that  he  had  no  doubt  that 
Seward  believed  that  Sumter  would  be  evacu 
ated,  as  he  stated  it  would  be ;  but  that  the  war 
party  overruled  him.  With  Judge  Campbell's 
later  statements,  founded  upon  his  recollections 
after  the  lapse  of  ten  years,  there  is  no  need  to 
concern  ourselves ;  so  far  as  they  conform  to  the 
contemporary  records  they  are  unimportant,  so 
far  as  they  modify  them  they  are  less  trust 
worthy.  Nor  is  this  the  place  to  discuss  what 
must  be  regarded  by  many  people,  whatever 
may  have  been  his  motives,  as  Judge  Campbell's 
equivocal  and  unfortunate  position  in  the  whole 
affair.  As  a  historical  episode,  the  incidents  have 
but  little  importance,  though  they  are  not  devoid 
of  interest  as  the  story  of  a  single  Southern  in 
trigue,  as  the  basis  of  a  serious  accusation  against 
Seward  they  seem  to  justify  this  somewhat  full 
statement  of  them.  It  is  difficult  to  understand 
how,  fairly  considered,  they  could  ever  have 
been  thought  inconsistent  with  perfectly  simple 
and  straightforward  dealing  on  his  part  in  the 
whole  matter,  or  why  he  should  not  be  fully 
exonerated  from  any  suspicion  of  bad  faith  at 
any  point  in  the  transactions. 


CHAPTER   XV. 

LETTER    OF    APRIL    1ST    TO    THE   PRESIDENT.  — 
THE    BLOCKADE. 

SEWARD'S  first  month  as  secretary  of  state 
was  not  to  close  without  another  incident  ^  of  no 
great  importance  except  as  it  throws  light  on 
the  state  of  the  times,  the  characters  of  both 
the  President  and  secretary,  and  their  relations 
to  each  other. 

On  the  1st  of  April  he  submitted  to  Mr.  Lin 
coln  a  paper  entitled  "  Some  Thoughts  for  the 
President's  Consideration,"  in  which  he  stated, 
that  at  the  end  of  a  month's  administration  we 
were  "  without  a  policy,  either  domestic  or  for* 
eign."  But,  though  he  admitted  this  condition 
to  have  been  unavoidable,  the  presence  of  the 
Senate  and  the  pressure  of  the  office-seekers 
having  prevented  attention  to  graver  matters, 
any  further  delay  to  adopt  and  prosecute  our 
policies  for  both  domestic  and  foreign  affairs, 
would,  he  said,  not  only  bring  scandal  upon  the 
administration,  but  danger  upon  the  country. 

As  to  domestic  policy,  he  suggested  that  "  we 
must  change  the  question  before  the  public  from 


LETTER    TO    THE   PRESIDENT.  277 

one  upon  slavery,  or  about  slavery,  for  a  ques 
tion  upon  union  or  disunion."  The  occupation 
or  evacuation  of  Fort  Sumter  being  regarded  as 
a  slavery  or  party  question,  although  it  was  not 
so  in  fact,  he  "  would  terminate  it,  as  a  safe 
means  of  changing  the  issue  ;  "  and  he  deemed  it 
"  fortunate  that  the  last  administration  created 
the  necessity."  He  would  reinforce  and  defend 
all  the  forts  in  the  gulf,  have  the  navy  recalled 
from  foreign  stations  to  be  prepared  for  a  block 
ade,  and  put  Key  West  under  martial  law. 

As  to  foreign  nations,  —  he  "  would  demand 
explanations  from  Spain  and  France  categori 
cally,  at  once ; "  and  would  convene  Congress 
and  declare  war  against  them,  if  the  explana 
tions  were  unsatisfactory ;  he  would  also  "  seek 
explanations  from  Great  Britain  and  Russia, 
and  send  agents  into  Canada,  Mexico,  and  Cen 
tral  America  to  rouse  a  vigorous  continental 
spirit  of  independence  on  this  continent  against 
European  intervention."  "  But,"  he  added, 
"whatever  policy  we  adopt,  there  must  be  an 
energetic  prosecution  of  it.  It  must  be  some 
body's  business  to  pursue  and  direct  it  inces 
santly.  Either  the  President  must  do  it  him 
self,  and  be  all  the  while  active  in  it,  or  devolve 
it  on  some  member  of  his  cabinet.  It  is  not 
in  my  especial  province,  but  I  neither  seek  to 
evade  nor  assume  responsibility." 


278  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

This  paper  was  evidently  written  before  Sew- 
ard  knew  that  the  President  had  definitely  de 
termined  on  the  expeditions  to  either  fort. :  It 
is  an  extraordinary  document  in  any  point  of 
view.  Its  suggestions  as  to  foreign  policy  would 
have  been  wild  at  any  time.  In  a  period  of 
domestic  peace  and  prosperity,  to  invite  the  ill 
will  of  all  the  European  powers  at  once,  and 
to  encourage  the  other  countries  of  America  to 
do  the  same,  would  have  been  a  mad  scheme. 
But  that  any  cabinet  minister,  when  his  coun 
try  was  distracted  by  domestic  difficulties  which 
threatened  its  destruction,  when  its  treasury  was 
bankrupt,  its  navy  scattered,  its  army  a  mere 
handful  of  men,  and  the  majority  of  its  offi 
cers,  both  naval  and  military,  of  doubtful  fidelity 
or  confessed  disloyalty,  and  when  an  absolute 
peace  and  a  friendly  understanding  with  all 
other  countries  was  essential  to  its  safety,  should 
propose  to  throw  down  the  gauntlet  to  the^ 
most  powerful  of  the  civilized  nations,  is  in 
comprehensible.  It  is  obvious  that  the  sugges 
tions  as  to  foreign  policy  came  from  the  be 
lief  that  a  foreign  war,  or  the  prospect  of  one, 
would  unite  all  our  people,  divert  the  attention 
of  the  South,  give  a  new  direction  to  the  ex- 

1  The  first  orders  as  to  the  Pickens  expedition  were  issued 
on  the  afternoon  of  April  1.  The  decisive  ones  as  to  Sumter, 
April  4. 


LETTER    TO    THE   PRESIDENT.  279 

citement  there,  and  put  an  end  for  the  moment 
to  all  schemes  of  secession.  But  that  Seward 
should  have  entertained  this  idea  only  shows 
how  blind  he  was  to  the  signs  of  the  times; 
how  his  very  nearness  to  the  troubles  prevented 
his  seeing  what  was  clear  to  more  distant  ob 
servers,  —  that,  while  the  politicians  at  Wash 
ington  were  "  vacillating  between  compromise 
and  resistance,  in  the  South  there  had  been  one 
steady,  uninterrupted  progress  toward  secession 
and  war." 

As  a  statement  of  the  extreme  need  of  a 
domestic  policy,  and  yet  of  its  entire  absence, 
Seward's  paper  only  repeated  the  common  talk 
of  the  time,  —  the  language  of  the  newspaper 
press  and  the  opinions  contained  in  the  pri 
vate  letters  not  merely  of  ordinary  observers,  but 
of  well-informed  and  sensible  persons.  Gen 
eral  Dix  wrote  about  this  time  :  "  When  I  left 
Washington  Saturday  last  (March  23),  I  do 
not  think  the  administration  had  any  settled  pol 
icy.  It  was  merely  drifting  with  the  current, 
at  a  loss  to  know  whether  it  were  better  to  come 
to  anchor  or  set  sail ; "  and  a  month  later  one 
of  the  most  distinguished  of  Lincoln's  cabinet, 
Mr.  Chase,  thought  that  the  President,  in  lieu 
of  any  policy,  had  "  merely  the  general  notion 
of  drifting,  the  Micawber  policy  of  waiting  for 
something  to  turn  up." 


280  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

Seward  had  already  made  the  suggestion  that 
the  issue  before  the  country  should  be  put  as  a 
question  of  union  or  disunion,  rather  than  as 
a  dispute  about  slavery.  It  was  of  the  first 
importance  that  this  should  be  done,  if  people 
at  the  North  of  all  shades  of  political  opinion, 
from  the  Breckenridge  Democrats  and  those 
Whigs  who  in  the  last  election  had  voted  for 
Bell  of  Tennessee,  to  the  most  radical  Republi 
cans,  were  to  be  united  in  support  of  the  govern 
ment.  The  difficulty  was  how  to  effect  this; 
but  we  had  not  long  to  wait  for  a  solution  of 
the  problem ;  the  seceding  states  determined  it 
for  us.  To  the  great  mass  of  the  Northern 
people  the  situation  was  wholly  changed  by 
the  attack  on  Sumter.  To  their  minds  it  was 
no  longer  a  question  whether  we  should  coerce 
the  South;  but  whether  we  should  see  the  na 
tional  flag  insulted,  national  troops  fired  on,  a 
national  fort  besieged  and  captured,  and  tamely 
submit  to  it.  To  this  question  there  could  be 
but  one  answer. 

Lincoln's  reply  to  Seward's  memorandum 
was  eminently  characteristic,  tactful,  and  judi 
cious.  It  dealt  with  the  several  points  of  the 
paper,  but  as  a  rule  did  not  combat  them  di 
rectly.  To  use  one  of  the  President's  favorite 
illustrations,  he  ploughed  round  the  log  rather 
than  attempted  to  go  through  it.  To  the  clos- 


LETTER    TO    THE  PRESIDENT.  281 

ing  suggestion  that  some  one  must  devote  him 
self  to  pursuing  the  policy  determined  on,  he 
replied  that,  if  any  one  were  to  do  this,  the 
President  must  be  the  person.  Having  sent  his 
answer,  he  put  the  paper  away  and  never  spoke 
of  it ;  its  existence  was  wholly  unknown  until 
after  his  death  and  its  publication  by  his  biogra 
phers. 

That  Seward  should  have  made  suggestions 
to  Mr.  Lincoln  is  not  extraordinary :  his  doing 
so  could  hardly  be  called  an  impropriety,  even  if 
it  were  not  within  the  strict  line  of  his  duty  as 
a  cabinet  minister.  Mr.  Chase  did  exactly  the 
same  thing  ;  and  other  people,  not  merely  men 
in  public  stations,  but  private  citizens,  were  at 
this  period  profuse  of  their  advice  to  the  Presi 
dent.  The  state  of  the  times  and  their  patriotic 
motives  were  their  justification  or  excuse.  The 
unpleasant  tone  of  Seward's  suggestions  is  to  be 
regretted  ;  they  have  an  impatient  sound ;  the 
whole  memorandum  seems  censorious  rather  than 
advisory;  it  bears  evidence  of  the  extremely 
high  pressure  under  which  he  had  been  living 
for  months,  and  the  state  of  nervous  tension 
produced  by  the  anxiety  and  suspense  of  the 
winter.  This  must  be  the  explanation  of  its 
closing  paragraph.  Its  suggestion  that  Lincoln 
ought  either  personally  to  discharge  the  duties 
of  his  office,  or  devolve  them  on  some  one  else, 


282  WILLIAM  IIENRY  SEWARD. 

would  have  quite  justified  the  President  in  ask 
ing  for  his  resignation.  He  did  nothing  of  the 
sort ;  so  far  as  is  known  the  matter  was  never 
alluded  to  by  either  of  them ;  it  never  chilled 
their  relations  to  each  other.  Seward  gave  to 
Lincoln  his  tireless  industry  and  his  undivided 
influence,  with  a  sincere  and  devoted  personal 
attachment ;  and  Lincoln  recognized  his  strength 
and  his  services,  and  repaid  them  with  a  perfect 
and  unwavering  trust.1 

Something  has  already  been  said  of  the  con 
dition  of  our  public  service  at  the  beginning  of 
Lincoln's  administration.  But  it  is  quite  im 
possible  for  any  one  not  at  that  time  in  active 
life  to  realize  the  extent  of  the  disintegration 
and  demoralization  which  then  prevailed  in 
every  department.  The  civil  service  contained 
many  men  who  thought  the  betrayal  of  their 
trusts  no  shame.  The  South  found  its  most  dis 
tinguished  officers  in  deserters  from  our  army 
and  navy.  Before  the  close  of  Buchanan's  ad 
ministration  one  of  our  generals  had  not  only 
treacherously  surrendered  to  the  secessionists  the 
public  property  of  the  United  States  confided 
to  his  charge,  but  had  attempted  to  carry  with 
him  into  the  rebel  service  the  troops  under  his 
command.  Another  officer,  whose  loyalty  was 
not  put  to  the  test  till  later,  received  and  trans- 
1  N.  &  H.  iii.  p.  449. 


THE   BLOCKADE.  283 

mittecl  the  orders  for  the  disposition  of  the 
troops  when  there  were  apprehensions  of  a  night 
attack  on  Washington,  and  the  same  evening  fled 
and  joined  the  hostile  forces.  In  the  diplomatic 
and  consular  services  there  were  men  who,  while 
holding  the  commission  of  the  United  States, 
negotiated  purchases  of  arms  for  the  rebels,  and 
others  who  assisted  their  cause  by  more  indi 
rect  and  less  conspicuous  means.  Four,  certainly, 
of  Buchanan's  foreign  ministers  returned  home 
only  to  accept  commissions  in  the  Southern 
army,  and  one  of  these  had  not  even  the  com 
mon  excuse  of  going  with  his  state,  for  his  state 
never  seceded.  In  his  instructions  to  Mr. 
Adams,  written  a  day  or  two  before  the  attack 
on  Sumter,  Seward  gives  a  vivid  and  forcible 
picture  of  the  situation  :  — 

"  The  party  which  was  dominant  in  the  fed 
eral  government  during  the  period  of  the  last 
administration  embraced  practically  and  held  in 
universal  communion  all  disunionists  and  sympa 
thizers.  It  held  the  executive  administration. 
The  secretaries  of  the  treasury,  war,  and  the 
interior  were  disuiiionists.  The  same  party  held 
a  large  majority  in  the  Senate,  and  nearly  equally 
divided  the  House  of  Representatives.  Disaf 
fection  lurked,  if  it  did  not  openly  avow  itself, 
in  every  department  and  in  every  bureau,  in 
every  regiment  and  in  every  ship  of  war,  in  the 


284  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

post  office  and  in  the  custom  house,  and  in 
every  legation  and  consulate  from  London  to 
Calcutta.  Of  four  thousand  four  hundred  and 
seventy  officers  in  the  public  service,  civil  and 
military,  two  thousand  one  hundred  and  fifty- 
four  were  representatives  of  states  where  the 
revolutionary  movement  was  openly  advocated 
and  urged,  even  if  not  actually  organized."  .  .  . 
The  new  administration  "  found  the  disunionists 
perseveringly  engaged  in  raising  armies  and  lay 
ing  sieges  around  national  fortifications  situate 
within  the  territory  of  the  disaffected  states. 
The  federal  marine  seemed  to  have  been  scat 
tered  everywhere  except  where  its  presence  was 
necessary,  and  such  of  the  military  forces  as 
were  not  in  the  remote  states  and  territories 
were  held  back  from  activity  by  vague  and  mys 
terious  armistices,  which  had  been  informally 
contracted  by  the  late  President  or  under  his 
authority,  with  a  view  to  postpone  conflict  .  .  . 
at  least  until  the  waning  term  of  his  adminis 
tration  should  reach  its  appointed  end.  Com 
missioners  .  .  .  sent  by  the  new  Confederacy 
were  already  at  the  capital  demanding  recogni 
tion  of  its  sovereignty,  and  a  partition  of  the 
national  property  and  domain.  The  treasury, 
depleted  by  robbery  and  peculation,  was  ex 
hausted,  and  the  public  credit  was  prostrate. 
"  The  period  of  four  months,  which  inter- 


THE  BLOCKADE.  285 

vened  between  the  election  which  designated  the 
head  of  the  new  administration  and  its  advent, 
.  .  .  assumed  the  character  of  an  interregnum, 
in  wfyich  not  only  were  the  powers  of  the  govern 
ment  paralyzed,  but  even  its  resources  seemed 
to  disappear  and  be  forgotten." 

From  the  time  when  his  secretary  of  state 
transmitted  to  our  ministers  abroad  Buchanan's 
message  of  December,  1860,  which  contained 
the  statement  that  in  his  opinion  secession  was 
a  revolutionary,  not  a  constitutional  right ;  but 
that  the  federal  government  had  no  power  to 
interfere  with,  restrain  or  coerce  any  state  at 
tempting  to  carry  out  this  revolution,  until  the 
28th  of  February,  1861,  less  than  a  week  before 
Lincoln's  inauguration,  no  general  instructions 
as  to  their  duties  in  the  grave  crisis  through 
which  we  were  passing  were  issued  to  our  for 
eign  ministers.  During  this  whole  period  the 
pernicious  doctrines  of  this  message,  which  gave 
to  secession  all  the  countenance  and  encourage 
ment  its  friends  could  expect,  were  permitted 
to  make  their  way  unchecked  throughout  the 
various  countries  of  Europe,  encouraging  their 
rulers  in  the  belief  that  the  ill  contrived  govern 
mental  machine,  the  United  States,  which  its 
own  President  declared  to  be  held  together  only 
by  the  mutual  consent  of  its  several  parts,  was 
fast  falling  to  pieces,  if  indeed  it  were  not 


286  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

already  broken  up.  At  length,  after  this  long 
silence,  but  not  until  the  very  close  of  his  official 
term,  the  Democratic  secretary  of  state  wrote  to 
our  representatives  abroad  a  circular,  in  which, 
after  reiterating  Buchanan's  declaration  that 
there  was  no  constitutional  right  of  secession, 
and  stating  again  the  sectional  character  of  the 
election  and  the  consequent  apprehensions  of  the 
defeated  party,  he  instructed  our  ministers  that 
the  President  expected  them  to  use  such  means 
as  might  in  their  judgment  be  necessary  and 
proper  to  prevent  the  success  of  any  attempts 
to  secure  from  the  European  powers  the  recog 
nition  of  the  new  Confederation,  declaring  that 
such  an  acknowledgment  by  any  European  gov 
ernment  would  tend  to  disturb  the  friendly  re 
lations  existing  between  that  country  and  our 
own. 

One  of  Seward's  first  acts  on  entering  upon 
the  duties  of  his  office  was  to  endeavor  to  re 
inforce  the  somewhat  formal  and  perfunctory 
directions  of  this  dispatch,  and  to  counteract  its 
statement  of  the  issues  and  results  of  the  elec 
tion,  —  a  statement  which  seemed  to  half  apolo 
gize  for  the  conduct  of  the  seceding  states.  For 
this  purpose  he  wrote  a  circular  dispatch  more 
bold  and  vigorous  in  tone,  in  which  he  inclosed 
Lincoln's  inaugural  address.  In  this  circular 
he  expressed  his  entire  confidence  in  the  main- 


UNIVERS 


THE   BLOCKADE. 


tenance  of  the  Union,  and  strove  to  impress 
foreign  powers  with  the  conviction  that  its  per 
petuity  was  more  for  their  advantage  than  its 
division  into  several  distinct  nationalities  would 
be  ;  while  he  also  counseled  our  ministers  that 
they  must  exercise  the  greatest  possible  dili 
gence  to  prevent  the  designs  of  those  who  would 
invoke  foreign  intervention  to  embarrass  or  over 
throw  the  republic. 

To  purge  our  diplomatic  and  consular  ser 
vice  of  all  persons  whose  loyalty  was  uncertain 
was,  however,  his  most  urgent  duty  ;  in  many 
cases  it  was  not  enough  that  our  representatives 
abroad  should  "  speak  only  the  language  of  truth 
and  loyalty,  and  of  confidence  in  our  institutions 
arid  destiny,"  but  it  was  of  the  utmost  conse 
quence  that  they  should  be  persons  selected  with 
especial  regard  to  their  ability  and  fitness  for 
the  posts  assigned  them.  It  could  hardly  be 
expected  that  Lincoln,  who  not  unnaturally 
considered  our  difficulties  as  a  domestic  quarrel 
with  which  foreign  nations  had  no  concern, 
should  be  so  keenly  alive  to  the  importance  of 
these  nominations  as  was  Seward  ;  but  he  soon 
brought  himself  to  attach  more  weight  to  fitness 
than  to  pressure  in  his  selection  from  the  candi 
dates  proposed,  and  was  willing  to  accept  the 
responsibility  for  several  of  them  being  "  hud 
dled  up  and  coming  from  a  small  section  of  the 


288  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

country."  There  may  have  been  differences  of 
opinion  between  the  President  and  secretary  as 
to  who  wonld  best  fill  some  of  the  vacant  places  ; 
but  the  appointments  were  as  a  rule  exception 
ally  good,  and  the  one  which  we  know  from  the 
President's  own  statement  to  have  been  made  at 
Seward's  pressing  instance  and  on  his  responsi 
bility,  that  of  Mr.  Adams  to  England,  as  it  was 
the  most  important,  proved  the  wisest  possible. 

With  the  actual  outbreak  of  the  rebellion,  the 
mode  of  dealing  with  our  Southern  ports  be 
came  a  matter  of  the  first  importance,  requiring 
an  immediate  decision.  To  leave  them  open  to 
commerce,  as  they  were,  was  out  of  the  question. 
It  would  enable  the  seceding  states,  by  the  export 
and  sale  of  their  cotton,  to  raise  money  to  sustain 
the  insurrection,  and  would  allow  the  unrestricted 
importation  of  all  sorts  of  arms,  equipments  and 
munitions  of  war,  as  well  as  of  such  articles  of 
daily  use  as  those  states  did  not  themselves  man 
ufacture.  Two  ways  of  closing  these  ports  were 
suggested.  One  was  -their  discontinuance  as 
ports  of  entry,  so  that  any  vessel  landing  her 
cargo  there  would  violate  the  laws  of  the  United 
States.  This  course  had  the  advantage  of  ease 
and  simplicity.  It  required  only  a  notice  from 
the  Executive  that  Charleston,  Savannah,  Mobile. 
New  Orleans,  and  the  other  Southern  cities  where 
there  had  been  United  States  custom  houses, 


THE   BLOCKADE.  289 

were  no  longer  ports  of  entry.  It  had  this  dis 
advantage,  that  if  any  vessel  paid  no  heed  to 
the  notice,  and  ran  in  with  her  cargo,  she  had 
simply  violated  a  revenue  law,  and  could  only 
be  punished  by  proceedings  in  a  federal  court 
of  the  state  and  district  where  the  offense  was 
committed;  and  all  these  courts  were  in  the 
hands  of  the  insurgents.  There  were  also  well 
grounded  apprehensions  that  other  nations  would 
consider  the  closing  of  the  ports  by  proclama 
tion  an  evasive  attempt  to  establish  a  paper 
blockade,  would  certainly  remonstrate  against 
it,  and  would  probably  disregard  it ;  and  that 
it  would  therefore  be  wholly  ineffectual.1  The 
other  method  was  an  actual  blockade.  The  ad 
vantages  of  this  were,  that,  as  it  closed  the  ports 
by  physical  force,  it  must  necessarily  break  up 
foreign  commerce,  and  that  any  vessel  violating 
it  could  be  captured  and  condemned  as  prize 
in  any  Admiralty  Court  of  the  United  States, 
or  in  that  of  any  foreign  country,  with  the  assent 
of  its  government.  The  objections  urged  against 
it  were,  that  a  blockade  was  strictly  an  act  of 
war,  and  that  to  proclaim  it  would  either  con- 

1  These  apprehensions  were  subsequently  shown  to  be  well 
founded.  When  Congress  in  the  summer  of  1861  passed  a  law 
authorizing-  the  President  to  close  the  Southern  ports  by  pro 
clamation,  it  was  at  once  made  a  subject  of  remonstrance  by 
both  England  and  France,  though  nothing-  whatsoever  had  been 
done  under  it. 


290  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

vert  the  insurgents  into  enemies  and  the  domes 
tic  insurrection  into  a  war ;  or  that  the  blockade 
would  be  declared  unlawful  by  the  courts,  and 
vessels  violating  it  could  not  therefore  be  con 
demned  ;  that  no  nation  had  ever  attempted  to 
establish  so  extensive  a  blockade,  and  that  we 
had  no  naval  force  at  all  adequate  for  the  pur 
pose. 

Seward  was  earnest  in  advocating  a  blockade, 
and  it  has  been  said  by  one  of  his  associates  in 
the  cabinet  that  he  was  principally  responsible 
for  the  adoption  of  this  alternative.  The  wisdom 
of  this  course  was  amply  justified  by  the  result. 
The  legal  objection  turned  out  to  be  unsound, 
the  supreme  court  deciding  that  a  blockade  of 
their  coast  was  a  legitimate  mode  of  dealing  with 
insurgents.  The  practical  difficulties  proved  to 
have  been  exaggerated  ;  the  coast  was  extensive, 
but  the  important  harbors  were  few.  The  validity 
of  the  blockade  was  never  seriously  questioned ; 
and  as  it  became  continually  more  effective,  it 
more  and  more  crippled,  and  in  the  end  prac 
tically  destroyed  all  foreign  commerce  at  the 
South,  cutting  off  both  their  resources  and  sup 
plies  for  carrying  on  the  military  operations  of 
the  rebellion.  Of  the  two  million  four  hundred 
thousand  bales  of  cotton,  the  crop  of  1861,  the 
largest  part  of  which  should  have  found  its  way 
across  the  Atlantic  by  the  summer  of  1862,  only 


THE    BLOCKADE.  291 

about  fifty  thousand  bales  ever  reached  Europe, 
of  which  England  received  the  lion's  share.  In 
December  of  that  year  (1862)  one  of  the  Con 
federate  cabinet  ministers  spoke  of  "  the  almost 
total  cessation  of  foreign  commerce  for  the  last 
two  years  "  as  producing  a  "  complete  exhaustion 
of  the  supply  of  all  articles  of  foreign  growth 
and  manufacture ; "  and  this  statement  was  con 
firmed  by  Lord  Russell's  almost  simultaneous 
declaration,  that  "  the  United  States  were  ena 
bled  by  the  blockade  to  intercept  and  capture 
a  great  part  of  the  warlike  supplies  which  were 
destined  to  the  Confederate  States  from  Great 
Britain." 


CHAPTER   XVI. 

ENGLAND'S    RECOGNITION   or  THE  CONFEDER 
ATES  AS  BELLIGERENTS. 

BEFORE  the  breaking  out  of  the  rebellion  the 
question  of  the  probable  attitude  of  the  great 
European  powers,  in  case  of  the  government's 
resort  to  force  to  maintain  the  Union,  had  occa 
sioned  no  uneasiness  at  the  North.  If  there  was 
any  public  opinion  there  on  the  matter,  it  was 
hardly  more  than  a  vague  notion  that  we  should 
be  left  to  settle  our  own  quarrel  in  our  own  way, 
the  North,  as  representing  the  cause  of  free 
dom  and  of  legitimate  government,  having  the 
sympathy  of  civilized  Europe,  while  the  South 
wrould  labor  under  the  odium  of  having  stirred  up 
a  rebellion  solely  for  the  purpose  of  perpetuating 
and  extending  African  slavery.  The  tone  of  the 
foreign  newspapers  warranted  this  belief.  In 
leading  articles  which  showed  their  writers  to 
be  familiar  with  our  Constitution  and  the  rela 
tions  between  the  federal  and  state  governments, 
any  attempt  to  destroy  the  Union,  whether  by 
individuals  or  by  states,  was  declared  to  be 
treason. 


RECOGNITION  AS   BELLIGERENTS.         293 

The  South  was  at  the  same  time  warned  that 
a  proposal  to  intervene  in  their  behalf  in  a 
struggle  against  the  Union  would  be  scouted 
nowhere  with  more  scorn  and  indignation  than 
in  those  districts  of  England  which  would  most 
benefit  by  free  trade  with  the  United  States; 
that  the  dissolution  of  the  Union,  so  far  from 
being  hailed  as  a  profitable  transaction,  would 
be  lamented ;  and  that  any  policy  would  mis 
carry,  which  assumed  that  England  could  be 
coaxed  or  bribed  into  a  connivance  at  the  exten 
sion  of  slavery.  The  English  government  was  in 
the  hands  of  the  Liberals,  —  the  party  of  reform, 
the  authors  and  advocates  of  an  extended  suf 
frage,  and  of  the  emancipation  of  the  slaves  in 
the  British  West  Indies.  No  important  ques 
tions  were  open  between  this  country  and  Great 
Britain,  and  the  North  assumed  that,  as  it  would 
in  any  event  remain  the  United  States  of  Amer 
ica,  the  friendly  relations  then  existing  would 
not  be  interrupted.  The  French  emperor  had 
been,  it  was  thought,  especially  cordial  in  his 
expressions  of  good  will  to  the  United  States  at 
his  New  Year's  diplomatic  reception  (January 
1,  1861),  and  the  French  press  had  expressed 
its  hopes  for  the  safety  of  the  great  American 
Republic  and  the  gradual  diminution  of  slavery. 
There  was  a  prevailing  notion  that  the  French 
would  feel  a  decided  sentiment  of  regret  at  the 


294  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

disintegration  of  that  Union,  which  France  had 
so  largely  aided  to  establish,  and  that  the  seced 
ing  states  would  meet  at  her  hands  nothing  but 
discouragement. 

At  the  South,  on  the  contrary,  the  confidence 
of  the  leaders  in  their  speedy  recognition  as  an 
independent  nation  inspired  them  with  a  con 
viction  of  success,  and  encouraged  them  to  has 
ten  the  work  of  secession.  They  argued  that 
Cotton  was  King,  and  that  the  loss  of  their 
great  staple  would  cause  such  distress  and  dis 
affection  in  the  manufacturing  districts  of  both 
England  and  France  that  the  two  governments 
would  be  forced  to  insist  that  any  war  which 
interfered  with  its  production  and  free  expor 
tation  should  cease.  They  also  relied  on  the 
cupidity  of  the  European  commercial  world,  to 
which  they  proposed  to  offer  the  bribe  of  free 
trade,  while  they  would  exclude  the  North  from 
their  markets  as  a  punishment,  if  their  peace 
able  secession  should  be  opposed. 

The  course  of  events  in  the  winter  and  early 
spring  of  1861  had  a  marked  effect  on  Euro 
pean  opinion.  First  came  Buchanan's  declara 
tion  that  there  was  nowhere  any  power  to 
prevent  the  withdrawal  of  any  state  from  the 
Union.  This  was  followed,  during  the  re 
mainder  of  his  administration,  by  an  inaction 
which  was  broken  only  by  an  abortive  attempt 


RECOGNITION  AS  BELLIGERENTS.         295 

to  reinforce  Sumter,  when  the  steamer  carry 
ing  the  troops  was  fired  on  by  South  Caro 
lina  militia.  The  federal  government  tamely 
submitted  to  the  insult  and  made  no  further 
attempt  to  strengthen  the  garrison,  while  the 
people  seemed  to  accept  the  situation  with 
tranquillity.  In  Congress  nothing  was  done 
to  prepare  for  the  emergency  of  a  forcible  re 
sistance  to  the  federal  authority,  and  Northern 
statesmen  and  newspapers  were  earnestly  ad 
vocating  concessions  and  peace.  During  the 
month  after  Lincoln's  inauguration  there  were 
no  signs  of  any  more  vigorous  policy ;  the  gov 
ernment  was  apparently  still  hesitating  and 
drifting.  On  the  other  hand,  the  secessionists 
had  been  making  steady  and  regular  advances. 
The  Southern  states  had  formed  a  new  Con 
federacy,  organized  its  government  and  elected 
its  officers,  had  ousted  the  United  States  from 
all  jurisdiction  over  its  territory,  and  by  the 
seizure  of  forts,  arsenals,  custom  houses  and 
mints,  had  turned  against  the  federal  govern 
ment  its  own  strongholds,  arms,  and  resources. 
The  Confederate  soldiers  were  being  drilled, 
instructed,  and  commanded  by  officers  who  had 
abandoned  the  government  that  had  trained 
and  educated  them;  and  the  work  of  organ 
izing  and  administering  the  civil  affairs  of 
the  Confederacy  was  in  the  hands  of  experi- 


296  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

enced  public  men,  who   had   hardly  ceased    to 
hold  office  under  the  United  States. 

The  South  was  an  oligarchy;  the  people  were 
accustomed  to  follow  their  leaders,  and  were 
not  so  sluggish  and  reluctant  to  move  as  the 
masses  of  the  free  states.  The  South  was 
roused  and  in  earnest,  the  North  still  apathetic 
and  inert.  When  Sumter  was  attacked,  it  was 
generally  believed  in  Europe  that  the  Union 
was  at  an  end,  that  the  South  had  practically 
secured  its  independence,  and  that  the  North 
would  soon  admit  this.  With  most  of  the 
European  governments  the  result  was  a  matter 
of  comparative  indifference ;  but  with  England 
and  France  this  was  not  so ;  the  prospect  that 
this  great  republic  might  break  in  pieces  was 
soon  followed  by  a  wish  that  it  would  do  so. 
The  vast  majority  of  the  great  governing  classes 
in  England  thought  that  the  division  of  the 
United  States  would  be  a  fresh  proof  of  the 
inability  of  a  republican  government  to  weather 
a  storm,  and  would  therefore  give  additional 
strength  and  stability  to  their  own  institutions. 
Some  of  them,  who  had  condemned  African  slav 
ery  as  a  foul  blot  upon  this  country,  excused 
their  support  of  the  slaveholders'  rebellion  by 
insisting  that  the  South  was  fighting  for  inde 
pendence,  the  North  for  supremacy.  The  mill 
owners  and  manufacturers  of  both  countries 


RECOGNITION  AS  BELLIGERENTS.        297 

were  anxious  lest  a  war  between  the  sections 
should  bring  on  a  cotton  famine  and  the  dis 
tress  which  would  accompany  it ;  and  the  appre 
hension  of  this  probably  had  the  greatest  effect 
in  determining  the  attitude  of  France  at  the 
outset  of  the  struggle.  Perhaps  the  feeling 
prevalent  among  the  average  Englishmen,  that 
the  Americans  were  a  boastful  and  conceited 
people,  and  that  it  would  do  them  no  harm  to 
have  their  pride  taken  down  —  though  it  may 
not  have  shaped  the  government's  policy  —  had 
more  effect  than  any  other  cause  upon  the  tone 
and  attitude  of  most  of  the  English  press,  which 
changed  from  that  of  friendliness  towards  the 
North  to  bitter  hostility  and  brutal  and  con 
temptuous  sneers. 

Seward  possessed  a  certain  knowledge  of 
Europe;  he  had  traveled  there  and  met  some 
of  the  leading  statesmen  ;  he  had  served  on  the 
Senate's  committee  on  foreign  affairs,  and  knew 
the  diplomatic  relations  between  this  country 
and  the  great  European  powers;  he  was  from 
the  state  of  New  York,  had  long  been  interested 
in  the  development  of  the  commercial  connec 
tions  of  its  metropolis  with  foreign  countries, 
and  knew  the  extent  and  closeness  of  these  con 
nections  with  both  England  and  France,  and 
especially  with  the  former.  What  complications 
might  arise  abroad,  growing  out  of  our  difficul- 


298  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ties  at  home,  he  could  not  foresee ;  but  it  was 
evident  that  the  seceding  states  would  make  all 
possible  efforts  to  obtain  recognition  as  a  nation, 
and  were  entirely  confident  of  their  speedy  suc 
cess.  He  thoroughly  realized  the  necessity  of 
our  being  represented  abroad  by  our  ablest  and 
fittest  men,  especially  in  England,  where  he 
expected  the  Confederacy  would  make  its  first 
and  most  strenuous  appeal,  and  would  not  cease 
to  renew  its  efforts  so  long  as  a  possibility  of 
hope  remained. 

Early  in  the  spring  Jefferson  Davis  had  sent 
abroad  commissioners  to  negotiate  for  the  recog 
nition  of  the  Confederacy;  but  their  presence 
in  England  seemed  to  furnish  no  cause  for 
anxiety,  as  we  were  still  confident  of  the  good 
will  of  both  its  government  and  people,  and  had 
moreover  the  assurance  of  Lord  John  Russell, 
the  secretary  of  state  for  foreign  affairs,  that 
"  the  coining  of  Mr.  Adams  would  doubtless  be 
regarded  as  the  appropriate  occasion  for  finally 
discussing  and  determining  the  question"  of 
the  attitude  to  be  taken  by  Great  Britain  to 
wards  the  rebellion.  The  Confederate  agents 
baited  their  hooks  judiciously,  and  had  the  au 
dacity  to  tell  Lord  John  that  it  was  not  any 
apprehensions  as  to  slavery,  but  the  protective 
tariff  on  which  the  North  insisted,  that  had 
made  it  necessary  for  the  Southern  states  to 


RECOGNITION  AS   BELLIGERENTS.        299 

secede,  since  free  trade  was  essential  to  their 
prosperity.  It  was  not  believed  at  the  time  in 
this  country  that  this  assertion  could  impose 
upon  any  one,  or  have  any  effect,  unless  its 
flagrant  disregard  of  truth  should  excite  a  smile. 
No  importance  was  attached  to  it,  for  neither 
our  government  nor  people  were  at  all  prepared 
to  believe  that  Great  Britain's  policy  towards  us 
was  to  be  that  of  a  nation  of  shop-keepers,  who 
would  justify  their  course  by  saying  that,  though 
they  objected  to  slavery,  they  wanted  cotton,  and 
they  disliked  the  Morrill  tariff. 

Seward's  first  serious  anxiety  as  to  our  foreign 
relations  was  caused  by  learning  through  Russia, 
that  the  French  Emperor  had  proposed  to  Eng 
land  that  they  should  act  in  concert  in  their 
course  towards  this  country,  and  that  England 
had  assented ;  that  Russia  had  been  invited  to 
join  this  league,  and  had  declined;  but  that 
it  was  confidently  expected  that  the  smaller 
European  powers,  and  those  having  less  interest 
in  the  matter,  would  follow  the  lead  of  France 
and  England.  This  intelligence  showed  him 
that  our  quarrel  was  not  considered  only  our 
own  affair ;  that  we  were  not  to  be  permitted  to 
settle  it  in  our  own  way ;  but  were  possibly  to 
be  threatened  with  a  combined  pressure  from 
the  European  powers,  which  we  could  not  resist, 
and  which  might  ultimately  force  us  to  acquiesce 


300  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

in  the  breaking  up  of  the  Union.  Upon  learning 
this  arrangement,  Seward  immediately  took  the 
only  means  in  his  power  of  averting  the  difficulty, 
by  notifying  our  ministers  that  this  government 
would  not  recognize  any  such  understanding  be 
tween  France  and  England,  and  would  decline 
to  receive  any  communications  as  joint  proposals 
from  these  two,  or  any  two  or  more  countries. 
He  adhered  to  this  resolve  when,  later  in  the 
year  1861,  the  British  and  French  ministers 
called  upon  him  together  to  present  a  joint  offer 
of  mediation  ;  lie  insisted  on  receiving  them  in 
separate  interviews  at  different  times,  and  dis 
cussing  each  proposition  as  if  it  were  a  distinct 
matter,  wholly  unconnected  with  the  other. 

The  knowledge  of  the  agreement  between 
these  two  great  powers  had  not  at  all  prepared 
Seward  for  the  first  decided  step  taken  by  them 
together;  or  it  is  perhaps  more  exact  to  say, 
that  the  statement  of  Lord  John  Russell  already 
quoted  had  given  him  absolute  confidence  that 
nothing  would  be  done  until  Mr.  Adams  had 

o 

arrived  and  had  the  opportunity  of  laying  before 
the  ministry  the  views  of  the  new  administration, 
with  which  he  was  fully  in  accord.  The  recog 
nition  of  the  rebels  as  belligerents,  made  after 
Mr.  Adams  was  known  to  have  sailed  for  Eng 
land,  and  the  publication,  on  the  very  day  of 
his  landing,  of  the  Queen's  proclamation  enjoin- 


RECOGNITION  AS   BELLIGERENTS.        301 

ing  her  subjects  to  observe  a  strict  neutrality  in 
the  civil  war  then  existing  between  the  Northern 
and  Southern  states,  seemed  to  Seward,  in  the 
moment  selected  for  this  action,  when  a  few 
days'  delay  could  have  done  no  possible  harm, 
a  breach  of  good  faith,  an  act  of  national  dis 
courtesy  and  of  personal  disrespect  to  our  minis 
ter.  In  substance,  too,  he  thought  the  proceed 
ing  of  the  British  government  unprecedented 
and  unjustifiable,  and  under  the  influence  of 
these  feelings  he  wrote  a  fiery  despatch,  which 
might  have  produced  a  rupture  between  the  two 
countries,  had  the  paper  been  treated,  according 
to  the  usages  of  diplomatic  correspondence,  as 
a  message  from  one  government  to  the  other, 
and  read  in  full  to  the  British  secretary  of  state. 
But  when  it  was  submitted  to  the  President, 
Mr.  Lincoln,  besides  suggesting  various  modifi 
cations  softening  its  tone,  advised  its  being  sent 
to  Mr.  Adams  for  his  own  guidance,  not  as  a 
dispatch  to  be  read,  and  that  this  should  be  dis 
tinctly  stated  in  the  letter  itself.  The  wisdom 
of  this  was  apparent ;  it  was  done,  and  Seward's 
original  draft  with  these  changes  made  by  the 
President  and  a  few  other  unimportant  verbal 
alterations,  conveyed  to  Mr.  Adams,  in  language 
which  did  not  admit  of  a  doubt,  the  views  of  our 
government  as  to  the  course  of  the  English 
ministry. 


302  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

Without   undertaking  to    discuss  elaborately 
how  far  the  United  States  had  just  cause  for  a 
serious  complaint  against  Great  Britain  on  ac 
count  of  her  recognition,  on  the  6th  of  May, 
1861,  of    the    Confederacy  as    a  belligerent,   it 
may  fairly  be  said  that  the  action  of  that  gov 
ernment  was  unprecedented  and  precipitate,  and 
could  only  be  regarded  by  us  as  ungracious,  if 
not  intentionally  offensive.    As  has  already  been 
stated,  early  in  April  Lord  John  Russell  had 
suggested    to    Mr.   Dallas,   who    was    then   our 
minister  in  London,  that  the  coming  of  his  suc 
cessor,  Mr.  Adams,  would  be  the  suitable  time 
for  discussing   any    question    between   the  two 
countries    connected    with   the    rebellion  ;    and 
again,  on  the  1st  of  May,  referring  to  the  rumors 
of  a  proposed  blockade,  he  agreed  that  the  time 
for  discussion  would  be  on  the  arrival  of  Mr. 
Adams,  who  was  to  sail  on  that  day.     Under 
these  circumstances  the  publication,  on  the  very 
day  of  Mr.  Adams's  landing,  of  the  Queen's  pro 
clamation  notifying  her  subjects  of  their  duties 
and   obligations  as   neutrals    in    the    civil    war 
then    raging   in  this    country,  whether  it  arose 
from    an  accidental  forgetfulness,  or  an  inten 
tional  disregard  by  Lord  John  of  his  conversa 
tions  with  Mr.  Dallas,  and  his  assurances  then 
given,  was  alike  ungracious  and  offensive  both 
to    Mr.  Adams    and   to    the    country  he  repre- 


RECOGNITION  AS   BELLIGERENTS.        303 

sented.  It  shut  the  door  in  his  face,  and  pre 
cluded  the  discussions  which  Lord  John  had 
suggested ;  and  it  was  obviously  intended  to 
do  this. 

That  Great  Britain's  recognition  of  the  Con 
federates  as  belligerents  was  unprecedented  is 
not  to  be  denied.  One  of  the  principal  grounds 
on  which  it  was  attempted  to  justify  this  re 
cognition  was,  that  an  insurrection  of  so  many 
provinces,  with  organized  governments,  and  a 
central  Confederate  administration  and  army  in 
existence  at  the  outset,  had  been  hitherto  un 
known.  Mr.  Adams,  replying  to  this  contention, 
reminded  Lord  Russell  that  there  had  been 
within  a  century  a  revolt  of  thirteen  provinces 
corresponding  in  every  particular,  except  that  of 
the  numbers  involved,  to  Lord  Russell's  descrip 
tion  ;  but  that,  notwithstanding  all  these  points 
of  identity,  Great  Britain  had  not  been  met  at 
the  outset  in  1774  with  the  announcement  by 
any  foreign  power  of  a  necessity  for  the  im 
mediate  recognition  as  belligerents  of  her  in 
surgent  American  colonies  ;  and  he  added,  that 
there  was  not  the  smallest  ground  for  believing 
that  Great  Britain  would  have  tolerated  for  one 
moment  any  such  proceeding,  if  it  had  been 
attempted.  The  only  historical  precedent,  to 
which  Lord  Russell  ever  referred  as  a  vindica 
tion  of  his  course,  was  that  of  the  recognition 


304  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

of  the  Greeks  as  belligerents  in  1825,  after  they 
had  maintained  during  four  years  the  struggle 
for  independence  ;  yet,  when,  after  this  lapse 
of  time,  such  recognition  was  granted  them,  the 
Turkish  Government  complained  of  it,  —  but 
Great  Britain  answered  that  a  people,  who  in  a 
contest  of  arms  had  already  covered  the  sea  with 
their  cruisers,  must  either  be  acknowledged  as 
belligerents  or  treated  as  pirates,  and  that  this 
latter  character  England  disclaimed  for  Greece. 
It  is  obvious  that  this  so-called  precedent  bears 
no  analogy  to  the  case  of  the  Southerners  in 
May,  1861.  The  cruisers  of  Greece  had  scoured 
the  Mediterranean  and  forced  the  English  Gov 
ernment  to  take  a  decided  stand  for  the  protec 
tion  of  Great  Britain's  commerce  and  merchant 
men.  The  Confederates  in  May,  1861,  had  done 
no  harm  at  sea,  were  then  utterly  incapable  of 
doing  any  such  harm,  and,  if  left  to  themselves, 
without  the  aid  of  British  intervention  and 
British  ships,  would  have  remained,  until  the 
insurrection  was  crushed,  as  powerless  at  sea 
as  when  Great  Britain  first  created  them  mari 
time  belligerents. 

It  is  equally  clear  that  the  action  of  the 
British  Government  was  precipitate.  Though 
France  and  England  had  determined  to  act  in 
concert,  France  took  no  similar  step  till  a  month 
later.  It  is  hardly  credible  that  Lord  John 


RECOGNITION  AS    BELLIGERENTS.        305 

Russell,  when  he  was  agreeing  with  Mr.  Dallas 
on  Wednesday,  that  the  arrival  of  Mr.  Adams 
a  fortnight  later  would  be  the  appropriate  time 
to  discuss  the  questions  of  policy  as  to  the 
Southern  Confederates,  should  have  been  at  the 
same  moment  seriously  considering  the  propri 
ety  of  at  once  recognizing  them  as  belligerents. 
Yet  he  did  so  recognize  them  publicly  and  offi 
cially,  on  the  following  Monday,  in  a  speech  in 
Parliament,  and  in  despatches  to  the  British 
Minister  at  Paris,  as  well  as  to  Lord  Lyons,  in 
both  of  which  he  speaks  of  the  late  Union.  The 
only  reason  he  assigned  in  his  speech  or  in 
either  of  his  letters  for  this  recognition  was, 
that  the  Southern  insurgents  had  established  a 
government  which  was  carrying  on  in  regular 
form  the  administration  of  civil  affairs.  But 
this  is  an  explanation  which  does  not  explain 
the  British  ministry's  haste.  The  organization 
of  the  Confederacy  took  place  before  the  end 
of  February.  It  was  no  new  fact ;  it  had  been 
known  in  England  for  weeks.  It  was  not,  how 
ever,  even  in  May  absolutely  true  that  the 
Southern  Confederacy  was  performing  all  the 
functions  of  the  federal  government ;  for  one  of 
the  most  important  of  them,  the  carrying  of  the 
mails,  was  done  by  the  United  States  through 
out  the  entire  South  until  the  1st  of  June. 
Between  Wednesday,  the  1st,  and  Monday  the 


306  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

6th  of  May,  nothing  had  happened,  no  new  intel 
ligence  had  been  received,  which  could  either  jus 
tify  or  account  for  the  ministry's  sudden  change 
of  front.  Yet  on  that  day  the  Southerners,  who 
up  to  that  time  had  been  insurgents,  became  bel 
ligerents,  and  the  fact  of  their  recognition  as  such 
was  announced  in  Parliament.  The  Queen's 
proclamation,  a  week  later,  was  merely  a  do 
mestic  publication,  cautioning  British  citizens  to 
govern  themselves  accordingly.  The  ministry 
had,  on  the  1st  of  May,  all  the  knowledge  as  to 
the  proposed  blockade  of  the  Southern  ports  by 
the  United  States,  and  the  issuing  of  letters  of 
marque  by  Jefferson  Davis,  which  they  possessed 
on  the  6th.1  They  had  not  at  either  date  any 
official  or  authentic  information  as  to  these  mat 
ters,  and  they  did  not  at  the  time  refer  to  either 
of  them  as  a  reason  for  their  conduct.  Both 
proclamations  were  mere  declarations  of  inten 
tions,  which  might  never  be  carried  into  effect, 
and  official  notice  of  them  would  not  therefore 
have  justified  any  such  hasty  action.  It  is  a  sig 
nificant  fact  that  the  blockade  was  first  officially 
mentioned  as  a  reason  for  this  sudden  announce 
ment  of  the  existence  of  a  civil  war  in  America 
in  the  letters  of  Lord  Russell  to  Mr.  Adams  at 
and  after  the  close  of  the  rebellion  in  1865. 

1  See  Lord  John  Russell's  letter  of  May  1st  to  the  Commis 
sioners  of  the  Admiralty.  Correspondence  concerning  Claims 
against  Great  Britain,  i,  p.  33. 


RECOGNITION  AS   BELLIGERENTS.        307 

In  its  haste  to  recognize  the  Southerners  as 
belligerents  the  English  ministry  almost  anti 
cipated  the  Confederate  Congress,  whose  Act 
declaring:  the  existence  of  a  war  between  the 

O 

United  States  and  the  Confederacy  was  first 
published  on  the  same  day  on  which  Lord  John 
Kussell  announced  in  the  House  of  Commons 
that  Great  Britain  considered  the  Southern  in 
surgents  a  belligerent  power. 

In  the  four  days  between  Lord  John's  inter 
view  with  Mr.  Dallas,  which  left  our  minister 
with  the  understanding  that  nothing  was  to  be 
done  until  Mr.  Adams  arrived,  and  the  govern 
ment's  declaration  in  Parliament,  there  was  only 
one  significant  incident,  —  the  unofficial  meet 
ing  of  Mr.  Yancey  and  the  other  Southern  com 
missioners  with  Lord  John,  at  which  they  assured 
him  that  it  was  the  heavy  duties  which  the  North 
had  forced  the  South  to  pay,  and  not  the  attacks 
upon  slavery,  that  had  driven  their  States  to  se 
cession  ;  that  the  new  Confederacy  had  abolished 
the  slave  trade,  was  opposed  to  a  high  tariff  and 
wished  only  to  sell  its  cotton  to  Europe  and 
make  its  purchases  there.  This  interview  took 
place  on  Saturday ;  on  Monday  the  letters  to 
Lord  Cowley  and  Lord  Lyons  were  written,  and 
it  was  announced  in  Parliament  that  the  govern 
ment  had  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  South 
ern  Confederacy  must  be  treated  as  a  belligerent. 


308  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

The  real  motives  for  this  hasty  action  can  only 
be  conjectured.  So  far  as  the  debates  in  Parlia 
ment  at  this  time  throw  any  light  on  the  matter, 
they  indicate,  that,  foreseeing  that  Englishmen 
would  be  likely  to  avail  themselves  of  Jefferson 
Davis's  offer  of  letters  of  marque,  the  Britisli 
government  determined  to  settle  by  anticipation 
the  question  of  the  character  of  such  adventurers, 
and  after  consulting  the  law  officers  of  the  Crown 
decided  to  recognize  at  once  the  Confederates  as 
belligerents,  in  order  to  prevent  any  privateers- 
men  who  were  British  subjects  being  treated  as 
pirates.  This  consideration,  together  with  the 
prevailing  idea,  —  probably  strengthened  to  a 
conviction  by  the  efforts  of  the  rebel  commis 
sioners  at  their  interview  with  Lord  John  Rus 
sell, —  that  the  schism  was  complete,  the  South 
ern  seceders  already  a  perfect  Confederacy,  and 
cotton  sure  to  come  more  quickly,  if  there  should 
be  some  act  on  the  part  of  England  which  could 
be  interpreted  as  the  expression  of  a  wish  for, 
and  a  belief  in,  the  speedy  success  of  the  South, 
may  perhaps  be  fairly  assumed  as  the  leading 
motives  for  the  sudden  and  decisive  action  which 
followed  so  closely  the  representations  of  the 
Southern  agents. 

Seward's  strong  feeling  as  to  the  matter  was 
not  uncalled  for  nor  unnatural.  He  realized 
what  British  recognition  meant,  what  courage 


RECOGNITION  AS   BELLIGERENTS.        309 

and  confidence  it  would  give  the  seceders,  how 
great  an  increase  to  their  strength  and  resources  ; 
while  he  also  knew  that  it  would  add  incalculably 
to  our  difficulties  and  indefinitely  prolong  the 
struggle.  His  repeated  remonstrances  and  un 
ceasing  endeavors  to  have  this  hasty  step  re 
called  were  therefore  no  more  than  his  duty, 
and,  if  ineffectual,  were  in  no  way  unreasonable. 
Mr.  Motley,  who  was  on  the  spot  and  in  a 
position  to  form  an  opinion  about  it,  thought 
that,  had  this  recognition  been  delayed  only  "  a 
few  weeks  or  even  days,"  it  would  never  have 
been  made.  Possibly  he  was  right ;  but  at  all 
events  we  may  moderate  our  natural  resentment 
at  this  early  unfriendliness  of  England  by  con 
sidering  that  our  actual  blockade  a  few  weeks 
later  would  have  justified,  in  point  of  law,  though 
it  would  not  have  required,  her  declaration  that 
the  secessionists  were  belligerents.  In  judging 
of  her  conduct  at  this  time  we  should  also  bear 
in  mind  the  natural  inclination  of  the  citizens 
and  government  of  a  free  country  to  sympathize 
with  any  people  in  rebellion,  to  assume  that  they 
have  good  reason  for  their  insurrection,  and  are 
really  striving  to  secure  some  right  which  is 
wrongfully  withheld  from  them.  Our  own  polit 
ical  history  furnishes  more  than  one  instance  of 
such  sympathy  on  our  part.  And  it  is  only  fair 
to  Great  Britain  to  make  some  allowance  for 


310  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

the  influence  which  this  feeling  had  in  bringing 
about  the  hasty  and  impulsive  step  of  her  gov 
ernment  on  the  6th  of  May.  Its  action  can  be 
called  fortunate  for  us  only  in  one  aspect.  It 
prolonged  the  struggle,  and  so  brought  about 
emancipation.  Had  the  rebellion  been  crushed 
quickly,  slavery,  the  cause  of  all  our  trouble, 
would  have  remained,  and  sooner  or  later  the 
battle  would  have  had  to  be  fought  over  again. 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

NEGOTIATIONS  AS  TO  THE  TREATY  OF  PARIS.  — 
SUSPENSION   OF   THE   HABEAS   CORPUS. 

BY  the  articles  of  the  treaty  of  Paris,  which 
was  made  at  the  close  of  the  Crimean  War  in 
1856,  the  leading  powers  in  Europe  agreed,  — 
in  order  to  mitigate  the  severities  of  maritime 
warfare  and  assimilate  its  usages  more  nearly  to 
those  of  war  on  land,  —  that  privateering  should 
be  abolished,  and  that  both  enemy's  property, 
not  contraband  of  war,  on  board  a  neutral  vessel, 
and  neutral  property,  not  contraband  of  war,  on 
an  enemy's  vessel,  should  be  exempt  from  capture 
and  condemnation  as  prize.  They  invited  other 
countries  to  subscribe  to  these  articles,  with  the 
hope  of  making  them  in  this  way  rules  which 
should  govern  naval  warfare  for  the  whole  civil 
ized  world,  stipulating,  however,  that  every  na 
tion's  assent  must  be  given  to  them  as  a  whole, 
or  not  at  all.  The  United  States,  whose  position 
was  usually  that  of  a  neutral,  wished  to  extend 
the  exemptions  from  condemnation  to  all  private 
property  not  contraband  of  war,  and,  postponing 
its  assent  to  the  treaty  as  it  stood,  opened  nego- 


312  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

tiations  for  this  purpose,  which,  though  appar 
ently  fruitless,  had  not  been  abandoned  at  the 
close  of  Mr.  Buchanan's  administration.  On 
the  24th  of  April,  1861,  Seward  instructed  our 
ministers  to  England  and  France,  as  well  as  to 
other  countries  which  had  assented  to  these  arti 
cles,  to  ascertain  whether  the  governments  to 
which  they  were  severally  accredited  were  dis 
posed  to  negotiate  for  the  accession  of  the  United 
States  to  this  treaty,  adding  that  the  assent  of 
these  governments  was  to  be  expected,  as  we 
should  accept  the  articles  precisely  in  the  form 
in  which  they  had  been  proposed  to  us.  These 
instructions  were  given  before  the  British  recog 
nition  of  belligerency,  and  when  there  was  no 
anticipation  of  any  such  action.  France  had 
not  yet  proposed  to  England  the  adoption  of 
a  common  line  of  conduct  towards  this  coun 
try  in  its  difficulties  ;  and  though  a  week  before 
(April  17,  1861)  Jefferson  Davis  had  published 
his  offer  of  letters  of  marque  to  any  one  wish 
ing  to  engage  in  privateering  on  behalf  of  the 
Confederate  States,  no  such  letters  had  been 
issued  or  applied  for. 

Our  negotiations  seemed  to  open  prosperously. 
They  were  delayed  on  various  grounds  ;  but  by 
the  middle  of  July  Mr.  Adams  was  officially  in 
formed  that  the  English  ministry  would  advise 
the  Queen  to  conclude  the  necessary  convention, 


THE  TREATY  OF  PARIS.        313 

so  soon  as  they  should  be  informed  that  a  similar 
convention  had  been  agreed  on  with  the  French 
Emperor,  so  that  both  might  be  signed  on  the 
same  day.  Ten  days  later,  however  (when  he 
notified  them  that  our  minister  to  France  had 
returned  to  Paris  to  propose  there  the  same 
arrangements),  Lord  Russell  wrote  him  :  "  On 
the  part  of  Great  Britain  the  agreement  will 
be  prospective,  and  will  not  invalidate  any 
thing  already  done."  The  meaning  of  this  some 
what  enigmatical  sentence  was  made  clear  a  few 
weeks  later,  by  the  announcement  that  Great 
Britain  proposed  to  add  to  the  convention  al 
ready  agreed  on  a  declaration,  "  that  by  exe 
cuting  that  convention  Her  Majesty  did  not  in 
tend  to  undertake  any  engagement  which  should 
have  any  bearing,  direct  or  indirect,  on  the  inter 
nal  difficulties  prevailing  in  the  United  States." 
Seward  approved  Mr.  Adams's  course  in  declin 
ing  to  sign  the  paper  with  this  addition,  which 
there  seemed  reason  to  believe  an  afterthought ; 
and  this  ended  the  negotiations,  the  French  gov 
ernment  desiring  to  attach  a  similar  condition- to 
its  assent. 

Seward's  objects  in  proposing  our  assent  to 
this  treaty  were,  probably,  to  declare  our  pur 
pose  of  conducting  our  contest  with  the  South 
under  the  humane  rules  agreed  on  by  the  lead 
ing  nations  of  the  world,  and  also  to  preclude 


314  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

the  recognition  of  privateers  under  Jefferson 
Davis's  letters  of  marque  as  vessels  having  any 
legal  status.  Before  the  declaration  of  May 
6th  this  result  might  have  followed  the  unquali 
fied  acceptance  of  our  assent  to  this  treaty  ;  but 
after  recognizing  the  Confederacy  as  a  belligerent 
both  Great  Britain  and  France  were  in  honor 
bound  to  take  no  step  which  might  impose  on 
them  obligations  inconsistent  with  this  position. 
Seward  was  equally  right  in  declining  to  accept 
the  arrangement  proposed.  It  would  not  have 
been  the  Treaty  of  Paris  to  which  we  should 
thus  have  become  parties,  but  a  different  and 
special  convention  with  England  and  France, 
implying  an  acquiescence  in  the  assumption  of 
these  governments  that  we  were  no  longer  the 
sovereign  of  the  states  in  insurrection,  and  had 
no  power  to  treat  for  them,  an  admission  which 
would  have  been  irreconcilable  with  our  position, 
that  the  integrity  of  the  Republic  was  unbroken 
and  the  government  of  the  United  States  su 
preme,  so  far  as  foreign  nations  were  concerned, 
as  well  for  war  as  for  peace,  over  all  the  states, 
all  sections,  and  all  citizens,  the  loyal  not  more 
than  the  disloyal,  the  patriots  and  insurgents 
alike.1  Seward  was  of  opinion,  however,  that 
the  real  objection  of  the  English  government  to 
giving  am  unqualified  assent  to  our  adherence  to 

1  Seward  to  Adams,  July  25,  1861. 


THE  TREATY  OF  PARIS.        315 

the  Treaty  of  Paris  was,  that  by  the  middle  of 
August  it  was  well  understood  that  any  vessels 
cruising  as  Confederate  privateers  would  be 
English  ships,  and  that  Great  Britain,  while  op 
posed  to  this  mode  of  warfare  in  the  abstract 
and  on  principle,  was  perfectly  willing  to  become 
the  patron  of  privateering  when  aimed  at  our 
devastation. 

Though  they  knew  that  Jefferson  Davis,  after 
his  call  for  privateers,  would  not  assent  to  the 
provisions  of  this  Treaty  as  a  whole,  —  the  only 
way  in  which  there  was  any  provision  in  the 
Treaty  itself  for  its  acceptance,  —  the  British 
ministry  thought  it  sufficiently  important  to  se 
cure  his  adherence  to  the  other  articles  (those 
relating  to  neutral  and  enemy  property  and  to 
blockade)  to  open  negotiations  with  him,  for  the 
purpose  of  obtaining  this.  They  selected  as 
their  agent  in  this  matter  an  Englishman, — 
their  own  consul  at  Charleston,  accredited  to  the 
United  States,  whose  exequatur  was  unrevoked. 
To  voluntarily  open  direct  negotiations  with  the 
insurgents  was  a  proceeding  sufficiently  con 
temptuous  of  the  United  States,  and  encoura 
gingly  near  to  complete  recognition  ;  and  so  Mr. 
Bunch,  the  consul,  an  active  sympathizer  with 
secession,  considered  it.  He  successfully  per 
formed  the  mission  intrusted  to  him,  and  ob 
tained  the  adhesion  of  the  Confederacy  to  these 


316  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

articles ;  but   was   indiscreet    enough   to   claim 
much  more.     The  bearer  of  his   letters  to   his 
government,    having    crossed    the   Union   lines 
without  permission,  was  arrested,  his  papers  were 
taken  from  him,  and  among  them  was  found  a 
letter  saying,  "  Mr.  B.  on  oath  of  secrecy  com 
municated  to  me  also  that  the  first  step  to  recog 
nition  was  taken.  .  .  .  This  is  the  first  step  to 
direct   treating    with    our  government,    so   pre 
pare  for  active  business  by  1st  January."     The 
whole  matter  having  in  this  way  come  to  Sew- 
ard's    knowledge,    he    remonstrated,    protesting 
against  Great  Britain's  employing  one  of  their 
public  officers  accredited  to  and  recognized  by 
the  United  States,  and  still,  in  the  legal  view 
of  both   governments,  exercising  his   functions 
there,  to  conduct  a  negotiation  with  insurgents 
in    arms    against  this  government,  whether  the 
insurgents   were    to    be    considered    as    simple 
rebels,  as  we  viewed  them,  or  to  be  treated  as 
belligerents,  as  Great  Britain  had  acknowledged 
them.     The  English  government  expressed  nei 
ther  regret  nor  apology.     They  maintained  the 
supercilious  tone  which  characterized  much  of 
their    correspondence    during    the     war,   until 
Gettysburg   and  Vicksburg  demonstrated   that 
the  suppression    of  the   rebellion  was  merely  a 
question  of  time.     The  whole  proceeding  shows 
how  illogical  and  inconsistent  was  the  attitude 

O 


OF  THE 

BSITY 


-  CORP  US.         317 

of  England  and  France  during  our  domestic 
difficulties.  The  rebels  were  parties  to  a  war  ; 
they  were  amenable  to,  and  to  be  governed  by, 
the  laws  of  war,  they  were  sufficiently  a  nation 
to  be  asked  to  become  parties  to  a  treaty,  yet 
not  so  far  a  nation  as  to  permit  negotiations  for 
this  purpose  to  be  conducted  in  any  regular 
manner. 

Not  long  after  the  attack  on  Sumter,  the 
President,  acting  upon  the  opinion  of  the  attor 
ney-general  that  he  had  the  power  to  do  so, 
suspended  the  writ  of  Habeas  Corpus  without 
any  special  legislation  authorizing  it.  Chief  Jus 
tice  Taney  held  this  suspension  illegal;  there 
upon,  when  a  British  citizen  residing  here,  ar 
rested  and  held  without  regular  process,  was 
unable  to  obtain  relief  by  applying  for  this  writ, 
Lord  Russell  undertook  to  open  a  diplomatic 
discussion  as  to  the  constitutionality  of  the  Pres 
ident's  action.  Seward  courteously  but  peremp 
torily  declined  to  enter  upon  any  such  discus 
sion,  or  to  permit  the  constitutionality  of  any 
act  of  the  administration  to  be  called  in  ques-" 
tion  by  any  foreign  power,  and  the  attempt  was 
not  renewed.  Nevertheless  every  foreigner  ar 
rested  by  arbitrary  process  naturally  appealed 
to  his  minister,  in  the  hope  that  diplomatic  in 
fluence  might  procure  his  discharge.  Most  of 


818  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

these  foreigners  were  Englishmen ;  their  cases 
occupied  a  great  deal  of  time,  and  were  a  constant 
source  of  worry  and  anxiety  to  Seward  during 
,  the  greater  part  of  the  war.  At  first,  and  until 
Mr.  Stanton  became  secretary  of  war,  all  these 
arrests,  as  well  of  our  own  citizens  as  of  foreign 
ers,  were  under  the  direction  of  the  State  De 
partment,  and  during  this  period  Seward  was 
earning  with  the  disloyal  and  their  friends  the 
name  of  a  tyrant  with  his  hands  full  of  despotic 
orders  of  arrest  and  imprisonment,  —  a  reputa 
tion  which  clung  to  him  long  after  he  had 
ceased  to  have  any  charge  of  these  matters. 

The  accusation  of  officious  intermeddling, 
which  has  been  to  some  extent  taken  up  as  a 
popular  cry  against  him,  has  its  origin  in  these 
and  other  acts  of  his  during  the  first  year  of  the 
rebellion,  when  the  War  Department  was  much 
disorganized  by  the  desertion  of  Southern  offi 
cers  and  clerks,  and  was  also  excessively  over 
worked.  There  were  many  things  which  needed 
to  be  done,  —  some  of  them  disagreeable,  — 
which  did  not  properly  belong  to  the  secretary 
of  state,  but  which  no  one  else  seemed  able  to 
find  time  or  inclination  to  do.  At  the  Presi 
dent's  request  and  to  the  entire  satisfaction  of 
all  loyal  citizens,  Seward  undertook  the  responsi 
bility  and  burden  of  some  of  these  matters.  In 
doing  so,  he  was  no  more  guilty  of  officious 


SUSPENSION  OF  HABEAS  CORPUS.    319 

intermeddling  than  were  the  "  great  war  Gov 
ernors,"  whose  zealous  loyalty  induced  them  to 
overstep  the  strict  line  of  official  duty  and  en 
deavor  to  relieve  the  War  Department  of  some 
of  the  burdens  of  the  equipment  and  transpor 
tation  of  troops,  which  properly  belonged  to  the 
general  government.  There  is  no  reason  to  be 
lieve  that  Seward  had  any  motives  for  what  he 
did  other  than  patriotic  ones ;  he  had  in  a  high 
degree  the  fervor  and  lofty  spirit  which  then 
animated  and  dignified  the  country.  The  time 
had  arrived  of  which  he  had  spoken,  when  we 
were  to  see  "  how  nobly,  how  firmly  a  great  peo 
ple  could  act  in  preserving  their  Constitution." 


CHAPTER  XVIII. 

THE   TRENT. 

THE  summer  of  1861  wore  away  without 
further  serious  diplomatic  trouble.  The  defeat 
at  Bull  Eun,  and  the  later  repulse  at  Ball's 
Bluff,  confirmed  the  general  European  opinion 
of  the  ultimate  success  of  the  seceding  states. 
It  had  severely  taxed  Seward's  optimism  and 
ability,  to  minimize  in  his  dispatches  to  our 
ministers  the  character  and  effect  of  these  fail 
ures.  Our  successes  in  the  West  were  too  re 
mote  to  offset  them  with  the  public  ;  and  the 
importance  of  the  capture  of  the  forts  and  garri 
sons  at  Hatteras  Inlet,  Port  Royal,  and  Hilton 
Head,  and  of  the  occupation  of  these  points  by 
the  Union  forces,  was  too  little  understood  to 
check  the  tide  of  European  opinion,  which  was 
running  strongly  against  us<  There  was  a  time 
in  the  autumn  when  Seward,  fairly  disheart 
ened,  wrote  home :  "  I  have  had  two  weeks  of 
intense  anxiety  and  severe  labor.  The  pressure 
.  .  .  which  disunionists  have  procured  to  operate 
on  the  cabinets  of  London  and  Paris  has  made 
it  doubtf  ul  whether  we  can  escape  the  yet  deeper 


THE    TRENT.  321 

and  darker  abyss  of  foreign  war.  ...  I  have 
worried  through,  and  finished  my  despatches. 
They  must  go  for  good  or  evil.  I  have  done 
my  best." 

The  moment  which  Seward  thought  so  gloomy 
seemed  to  Jefferson  Davis  auspicious  for  a  vigor 
ous  and  determined  effort  to  obtain  from  Eng 
land  and  France  the  full  recognition  of  the  South 
ern  Confederacy  as  an  independent  nation ;  and 
early  in  the  autumn  he  sent  James  M.  Mason, 
of  Virginia,  to  England,  and  John  Slidell,  of 
Louisiana,  to  France,  as  commissioners  to  open 
negotiations  for  this  purpose.  Slidell  was  a 
Northerner  by  birth,  who  had  made  his  for 
tune  in  Louisiana,  and  who,  while  still  United 
States  senator  from  that  state,  had  been,  during 
Buchanan's  administration,  a  most  zealous  and 
efficient  worker  in  the  cause  of  secession,  using 
his  official  position  to  break  up  the  govern 
ment  of  which  he  was  a  member.  Mason,  if 
less  conspicuous,  had  been  no  less  earnest,  and 
had  done  all  in  his  power  to  prevent  a  free, 
honest,  and  independent  vote  in  Virginia  on 
the  question  of  the  secession  of  that  state.  If 
the  United  States  were  a  government  and  not 
a  mere  voluntary  association,  both  were  traitors, 
and  both  were  especially  odious  and  infamous 
in  the  eyes  of  the  loyal  people  of  the  country. 
On  a  dark  night  in  October  these  envoys  with 


322  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

their  families  and  secretaries  ran  the  blockade 
at  Charleston  in  the  little  steamer  Theodora, 
and  arrived  safely  at  Havana,  where,  after  re 
ceiving  much  attention  from  the  authorities, 
they  embarked  on  the  British  mail  steamer 
Trent  for  St.  Thomas,  proposing  to  sail  thence 
for  England.  The  United  States  frigate  San 
Jacinto,  commanded  by  Captain  Charles  Wilkes, 
boarded  the  Trent  between  Havana  and  St. 
Thomas ;  but  instead  of  putting  on  board  a 
prize  crew  and  sending  the  steamer  to  a  port 
of  the  United  States,  that  the  question  of  her 
liability  to  condemnation,  as  a  neutral  carrying 
contraband  of  war,  might  be  settled  in  a  Prize 
Court,  Captain  Wilkes,  out  of  consideration  for 
the  convenience  of  the  other  passengers  and  for 
the  regular  business  of  the  steamer,  contented 
himself  with  taking  on  board  his  own  ship  the 
commissioners  and  their  secretaries,  leaving  the 
Trent  to  continue  her  voyage  with  her  other 
passengers  and  her  mails. 

When  the  news  of  this  reached  England  the 
excitement  was  intense,  public  opinion  was 
unanimous,  and  the  public  passion  at  fever  heat. 
The  British  flag  had  been  insulted ;  the  prison 
ers  must  be  given  up  and  a  suitable  apology 
made.  Troops  were  at  once  ordered  to  Canada 
and  ships  of  war  were  made  ready  for  sea ;  in 
the  arsenals  and  dockyards  the  business  of  pre- 


THE    TRENT.  323 

paration  was  pushed  forward  day  and  night  and 
even  on  Sunday ;  and  the  first  transport  left 
the  Mersey  with  the  regimental  band  playing 
"  I  wish  I  was  in  Dixie."  The  British  minis 
try  had  some  time  before  received  information 
from  a  source  which  they  professed  to  think 
worthy  of  belief,  that  the  government  of  the 
United  States  was  expecting  Mason  and  Slidell 
fco  embark  on  the  Trent,  and  had  given  express 
orders  for  their  capture.  On  the  receipt  o£ 
this  information  the  law  officers  of  the  crown 
had  been  consulted,  and  had  advised  the  minis 
try  that  a  United  States  man-of-war  overhaul 
ing  the  Trent,  capturing  her  and  carrying  her 
into  port,  would  be  exercising  a  recognized  bel 
ligerent  right  ;  but  that  if  she  merely  took 
the  Confederate  commissioners  and  their  des 
patches  and  let  the  steamer  go,  she  would  be 
clearly  wrong ;  or,  as  has  been  said,  "  if  the 
British  flag  were  more  grossly  insulted  there 
would  be  less  or  no  cause  of  complaint."  After 
exact  information  of  what  had  been  done  was 
received  in  England,  the  Queen's  legal  advisers, 
being  again  consulted,  reiterated  their  opinion ; 
so  that  upon  the  actual  facts  the  British  case 
appeared  quite  perfect.  The  English  ministers 
had  been  told  by  Miss  Slidell  that  the  officer  who 
boarded  the  Trent  stated  that  the  commander  of 
the  San  Jacinto  had  no  instructions,  but  was 


324  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

acting  solely  on  his  own  responsibility.  They, 
however,  permitted  the  receipt  of  this  informa 
tion  and  even  an  authentic  confirmation  of  the 
officer's  statement  to  be  denied  by  the  party  press, 
though  they  communicated  it  to  the  Queen  when 
the  despatch,  as  originally  drafted,  was  shown 
her.  The  Queen  was  distressed  at  the  peremp 
tory  tone  of  this  paper;  at  her  request  Prince 
Albert  prepared  a  memorandum  embodying  her 
views,  and  the  despatch  was  modified  to  conform 
to  them.  A  pathetic  interest  attaches  to  this 
incident  from  the  fact  that  Prince  Albert  was  at 
the  time  suffering  from  the  illness  which  shortly 
afterwards  proved  fatal,  and  that  this  memoran 
dum  was  the  last  thing  he  ever  wrote. 

The  officer  who  boarded  the  Trent  had  stated 
the  simple  truth,  —  Wilkes  was  acting  solely 
on  his  own  judgment  and  responsibility.  The 
first  knowledge  that  either  our  government  or 
people  had  of  the  matter  was  by  a  telegram 
from  Fortress  Monroe,  where  the  San  Jacinto 
touched  for  coal  (November  15,  16,  1861)  and 
proceeding  thence  directly  to  New  York  was 
met  in  the  harbor  there  by  orders  to  carry  the 
prisoners  to  Boston,  and  deliver  them  to  the 
commandant  at  Fort  Warren.  By  universal 
consent  Wilkes  became  at  once  a  hero ;  the 
newspapers  and  the  people  praised  him  as  if 
he  had  won  a  great  naval  victory;  he  was 


THE    TRENT.  325 

feasted  in  Boston,  and  honored  in  New  York. 
The  secretary  of  the  navy  on  receiving  his 
report  wrote  him :  "  Especially  do  I  congratu 
late  you  on  the  great  public  service  you  have 
rendered  in  the  capture  of  the  rebel  commis 
sioners.  .  .  .  Your  conduct  in  seizing  these 
public  enemies  was  marked  by  intelligence, 
ability,  decision,  and  firmness,  and  has  the  em 
phatic  approval  of  this  department."  The  an 
nual  report  of  the  Navy  Department  repeated 
and  indorsed  this  approval,  and  when  Congress 
met,  the  House  of  Kepresentatives  voted  Cap 
tain  Wilkes  a  gold  medal  for  his  good  conduct 
in  promptly  arresting  the  rebel  ambassadors. 

Except  the  letter  from  the  secretary  of  the 
navy  and  the  passage  in  his  report,  which  may 
be  fairly  taken  as  representing  his  own  opinion 
at  the  time,  there  is  little  if  any  contemporary 
evidence  as  to  what  the  President  or  any  mem 
ber  of  his  cabinet  thought  about  the  matter 
when  the  news  of  the  capture  of  the  commis 
sioners  first  reached  them.  In  writing  from  his 
recollection  ten  years  later,  Mr.  Welles,  whose 
object  at  that  time  was  to  depreciate  Seward  as 
much  as  possible,  said  "  that  no  man  was  more 
elated  or  jubilant  than  Seward  at  the  capture  of 
the  emissaries,  and  that  for  a  time  he  made  no 
attempt  to  conceal  his  gratification  and  approval 
of  the  act  of  Wilkes."  Without  actually  indors- 


326  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

ing  this  statement  of  Mr.  Welles,  or  bringing 
forward  a  single  fact  in  support  of  their  view, 
Mr.  Lincoln's  biographers  say :  "  Mr.  Seward 
was  doubtless  elated  by  the  first  news  that  the 
rebel  envoys  were  captured."  So  far  as  can  be 
ascertained,  there  is  not  a  solitary  fact  tending 
to  support  either  statement. 

Dr.  Kussell,  the  correspondent  of  the  "  Lon 
don  Times,"  who  was  in  Washington  when  the 
news  of  the  capture  reached  there,  says  that 
"  at  the  State  Department  there  was  a  judicious 
reticence  observed  about  it."  Mr.  Sunnier, 
arriving  there  for  the  opening  of  Congress, 
writes :  "  I  learned  from  the  President  and  from 
Mr.  Seward  that  neither  had  committed  him 
self  on  the  Trent  affair,  and  that  it  was  an 
absolutely  unauthorized  act.  Mr.  Seward  told 
me  that  he  was  reserving  himself  in  order  to 
see  what  view  England  would  take."  Even  to 
his  family  Seward  said  nothing.  The  only 
allusion  to  the  affair  that  appears  in  any  domes 
tic  letter  prior  to  the  settlement  of  the  case  is 
contained  in  a  single  line,  "  The  Mason  and 
Slidell  affair  will  try  the  British  temper." 

His  son,  then  the  assistant  secretary  of 
state,  and  in  daily  confidential  relations  with 
him,  and  who  was  also  his  biographer,  whose 
narrative  of  the  whole  transaction  is  founded 
not  upon  his  recollection  but  upon  notes  made 


THE   TRENT.  327 

at  the  time,1  speaks  of  his  abstaining  from  all 
conversation  on  the  subject.  Seward  did  see 
McClellan  on  the  17th  of  November.2  There 
seems  to  be  no  reason,  however,  to  suppose  that 
McClellan  was  volunteering  his  advice,  as  he 
has  been  charged  with  doing  ;  on  the  contrary 
it  has  been  said  on  trustworthy  authority  that 
Seward  sent  for  McClellan  when  he  first  learned 
of  the  capture,  and  asked  him  what  we  could 
do  if  Great  Britain  made  a  peremptory  demand 
for  Mason  and  Slidell,  and  the  alternative  was 
either  their  surrender  or  war ;  that  he  was  told 
in  reply  that  if  we  went  to  war  with  England 
we  must  at  once  abandon  all  hope  of  keeping 
the  South  in  the  Union  ;  and  that  he  thereupon 
said  that,  "  if  the  matter  took  that  turn,  they 
must  be  at  once  given  up."  3  It  is  further  to 
be  observed  that  the  subject  was  not  alluded 
to  in  the  President's  message,  and  Mr.  Sumner 
tells  us  was  not  touched  upon  in  the  cabinet  or 
in  conversation. 

The  first  thing  which  Seward  is  known  to 
have  said  or  written  about  this  affair  is  his  con 
fidential  letter  to  Mr.  Adams,  on  November  27, 
in  which  he  cautiously  refrains  from  expressing 
any  opinion,  and  says  :  "  I  forbear  from  speak- 

1  Letter  of  F.  W.  Seward,  February,  1896. 

2  McClellan's  Own  Story,  pp.  175,  176. 

3  R.  H.  Dana,  Jr.,  to  the  writer,  January,  1862. 


328  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ing  of  the  capture  of  Messrs.  Mason  and  Sli- 
dell.  The  act  was  done  by  Commodore  Wilkes, 
without  instructions,  and  even  without  the  know 
ledge  of  the  government.  Lord  Lyons  has  judi 
ciously  refrained  from  all  communication  with 
me  on  the  subject,  and  I  thought  it  equally  wise 
to  reserve  ourselves  until  we  hear  what  the  Brit 
ish  government  may  have  to  say."  Seward 
repeated  this  in  an  official  despatch  of  Novem 
ber  30th,  which  was  communicated  to  the  Brit 
ish  government,  but  which,  as  has  already  been 
said,  was  not  suffered  to  find  its  way  to  the 
public,  while  its  statements  were  denied  by  the 
ministerial  press.  From  the  day  when  the  cap 
ture  was  first  known  Mr.  Seward  and  the  Brit 
ish  minister  did  not  meet,  until  on  the  20th  of 
December  Lord  Lyons  came  to  the  State  De 
partment,  bringing  with  him  his  government's 
despatch,  submitted  it  informally  to  Mr.  Seward, 
and  gave  him  a  copy. 

The  reserve  of  Seward  and  Lord  Lyons, 
and  their  avoidance  of  each  other  during  this 
month  of  waiting,  show  how  strongly  both  felt 
the  gravity  of  the  situation,  and  their  apprehen 
sion  of  most  serious  consequences.  If  Seward 
hoped  that  the  British  demand  might  leave  some 
loophole  for  negotiation,  he  had  evidently  fore 
seen  the  possibility  that  the  English  might  take 
a  tone  which  left  us  only  the  alternative  of  the 


THE    TRENT.  329 

surrender  of  our  prisoners  or  war,  and  had  de 
cided  upon  his  course  if  this  should  be  the 
case. 

It  was  insisted  in  Lord  Russell's  despatch  that 
the  forcible  taking  of  the  commissioners  from 
a  neutral  ship  pursuing  a  lawful  and  innocent 
voyage  was  an  affront  to  the  British  flag,  and 
a  violation  of  international  law  ;  and  a  confident 
hope  was  expressed  that,  when  the  matter  was 
brought  under  the  consideration  of  our  govern 
ment,  it  would  voluntarily  offer  the  only  redress 
that  could  satisfy  the  British  nation,  —  the  re 
storation  of  the  captured  persons  to  British  pro 
tection,  and  an  apology  for  the  aggression  com 
mitted.  The  demand  for  an  apology  was  not 
pressed  and  no  apology  was  ever  made.  That 
for  the  return  of  the  prisoners,  if  not  unconrte- 
ous  in  tone,  was  absolute  and  peremptory.  Two 
sets  of  private  instructions  to  Lord  Lyons  ac 
companied  the  despatch.  Both  these,  how 
ever,  were  at  the  time  unknown  to  our  gov 
ernment  and  to  Seward.  The  first  of  them 
gave  to  the  demand  the  character  of«ft  threat. 
It  directed  Lord  Lyons,  if  it  should  not  be  com 
plied  with  in  seven  days,  to  close  the  legation, 
remove  the  archives,  notify  the  admiral  of  the 
British  Atlantic  fleet  and  the  governors  of  the 
North  American  and  West  Indian  colonies,  and 
return  home ;  but  the  second  private  note,  writ- 


330  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ten  later,  and  apparently  intended  to  soften  the 
public  despatch  as  well  as  the  earlier  instruc 
tions,  gave  him  a  discretion  which  would  tend 
to  avoid  a  war,  and  expressed  the  wish  that  he 
would  not  formally  deliver  the  despatch  at  once, 
but  prepare  the  way,  and  ask  Mr.  Seward  be 
fore  its  delivery  to  settle  with  the  President  and 
cabinet  the  course  they  would  propose.  Acting 
upon  these  suggestions,  Lord  Lyons  left  with 
Seward  on  Friday  a  copy,  and  on  the  Monday 
following  (December  23d)  made  a  formal  deliv 
ery  of  his  despatch.  In  this  interval  the  sec 
retary  had  not  been  idle.  The  manner  in  which 
he  employed  the  time  leaves  no  room  for  doubt 
that  he  had  already  carefully  considered  the 
situation  and  studied  the  law  of  the  case,  and 
had  determined  not  only  what  he  should  an 
swer  if  the  British  demand  were  for  an  absolute 
surrender  of  the  men,  but  also  the  grounds  on 
which  he  would  rest  his  compliance.  Shutting 
himself  in  his  room,  and  barring  his  door  against 
all  interruption,  he  began  at  once  the  draft  of 
his  repl^. 

The  cabinet  met  on  Christmas  day  (Wednes 
day),  and  Seward  read  them  his  proposed  an 
swer,  lie  writes  :  "  It  (the  case)  was  consid 
ered  on  my  presentation  of  it  on  the  25th  and 
26th  of  December.  The  government,  when  it 
took  the  subject  up,  had  no  idea  of  the  grounds 


THE    TRENT.  331 

upon  which  it  would  explain  its  action,  nor  did 
it  believe  it  would  concede  the  case.  Yet  it  was 
heartily  unanimous  in  the  actual  result  after  two 
days'  examination,  and  in  favor  of  the  release."  l 
Two  other  members  of  the  cabinet  have  given 
us  accounts  of  these  meetings  which  are  en 
tirely  in  accord  with  this  statement.  Mr.  Bates, 
the  attorney-general,  in  his  diary  says :  "  Sew- 
ard  read  his  proposed  despatch;  it  was  exam 
ined  and  criticised  by  us  with  apparently  per 
fect  candor  and  frankness.  All  of  us  were  im 
pressed  with  the  magnitude  of  the  subject-.  .  .  . 
I  urged  the  necessity  of  the  case,  —  that  to  go 
to  war  with  England  is  to  abandon  all  hope  of 
suppressing  the  rebellion.  .  .  .  The  maritime 
superiority  of  Britain  would  sweep  us  from  all 
the  Southern  waters.  Our  trade  would  be  ut 
terly  ruined  and  our  treasury  bankrupt.  There 
was  great  reluctance  on  the  part  of  some  of  the 
members  of  the  cabinet  —  and  even  the  Presi 
dent  himself — to  acknowledge  these  obvious 
truths  ;  but  all  yielded  to,  and  unanimously  con 
curred  in,  Mr.  Seward's  letter,  .  .  .  after  some 
verbal  and  formal  amendments."2  Mr.  Chase 
wrote  in  his  journal :  "  I  give  my  adhesion, 
therefore,  to  the  conclusion  at  which  the  sec- 

1  Letter  to  Weed,  January  2,  1862.      Memoirs  of  Thurlow 
Weed,  ii.  p.  409. 

2  N.  &  H.  v.  p.  35. 


332  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

retary  of  state  has  arrived.  It  is  gall  and 
wormwood  to  me.  But  I  am  consoled  by  the 
reflection  that  .  .  .  the  surrender  under  exist 
ing  circumstances  is  ...  simply  giving  the 
most  signal  proof  that  the  American  nation  will 
not,  under  any  circumstances,  .  .  .  commit  even 
a  technical  wrong  against  neutrals." 

Mr.  Lincoln's  biographers  and  other  writers 
have  assumed  or  claimed  that  the  settlement  of 
the  Trent  case  was  substantially  his  work,  that 
his  judgment  favored  the  surrender  of  the  pris 
oners,  and  that  he  intimated  to  Seward  the  need 
of  finding  good  diplomatic  reasons  for  so  doing. 
Whatever  Mr.  Lincoln  said,  thought,  or  did 
about  this  matter  can  neither  greatly  add  to  nor 
detract  from  his  fame,  which  rests  upon  other 
and  wholly  distinct  grounds  :  but  justice  to 
Seward  demands  that  he  should  receive  in  this 
matter  the  credit  to  which  he  is  fairly  entitled. 
It  is  only  so  far  as  they  are  consistent  with  what 
we  know  from  contemporary  evidence  that  Mr. 
Lincoln  actually  said  or  did  at  the  time,  that 
credit  should  be  given  to  the  personal  recollec 
tions  of  the  popular  writer,  who  tells  us  that  on 
lihe  day  when  the  news  of  the  capture  of  the 
commissioners  reached  Washington  he  went  to 
the  White  House  in  company  with  a  Treasury 
official  and  saw  the  President,  who  said  to  him  : 
1  Warden's  Life  of  Chase,  p.  394. 


THE    TRENT.  333 

"  We  must  stick  to  American  principles  con 
cerning  the  rights  of  neutrals.  We  fought  Great 
Britain  for  insisting  by  theory  and  practice  on 
the  right  to  do  precisely  what  Captain  Wilkes 
has  done.  If  Great  Britain  shall  now  protest 
against  the  act,  and  demand  their  release,  we 
must  give  them  up,  apologize  for  the  act  as  a 
violation  of  their  doctrines,  and  thus  forever 
bind  her  over  to  keep  the  peace  in  relation  to 
neutrals,  and  so  acknowledge  she  has  been  wrong 
for  sixty  years."  1 

This  story  was  first  published  more  than  seven 
years  after  the  transaction  took  place,  and  nearly 
three  years  after  Lincoln's  death.  It  has  never 
been  confirmed  ;  though  it  has  been  quoted  again 
and  again  by  writers  of  history  and  biography, 
who  sometimes  give  credit  to  Mr.  Lossing  and 
sometimes  do  not.  Whatever  one  may  think  as 
to  the  substance  of  the  alleged  conversation,  it 
is  evident  that  the  language  as  reported  is  Mr. 
Lossing' s  own,  and  not  that  of  Mr.  Lincoln  ; 
and  it  will  be  quite  as  apparent,  when  we  come 
to  examine  what  we  do  really  know  about  Mr. 
Lincoln's  conduct  in  this  matter,  that,  if  he  said 
anything  which  justified  Mr.  Lossing's  statement, 
it  was  a  mere  passing  thought,  not  the  expression 
of  any  fixed  conviction.  The  anecdote  related 
by  Mr.  Welles  was  so  often  told  at  the  time 
1  Lossing's  Pictorial  History  of  the  Civil  War,  ii.  156,  157. 


334  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

that  it  may  fairly  be  considered  as  supported  by 
contemporaneous  proof.  "  The  President,"  says 
Mr.  Welles,  "  was  from  the  first  impressed  with 
the  gravity  of  the  situation,  and  thought  the 
capture  embarrassing.  His  chief  anxiety  was  as 
to  the  disposition  of  the  prisoners,  who,  to  use 
his  own  expression,  would  be  elephants  on  our 
hands  that  we  could  not  easily  dispose  of.  Pub 
lic  indignation  was  so  overwhelming  against  the 
chief  conspirators  that  he  feared  it  would  be 
difficult  to  prevent  severe  and  exemplary  pun 
ishment,  which  he  always  deprecated."  This 
opinion  is  quite  different  from  what  Mr.  Lossing 
reports  to  have  been  the  President's  views  ex 
pressed  to  him  on  the  same  day,  even  if  the  two 
accounts  are  not  absolutely  inconsistent  with  one 
another. 

Of  the  President's  subsequent  reticence  we 
have  already  spoken.  Sumner,  after  his  arrival 
in  Washington,  writes  that  he  has  "seen  him 
almost  daily  and  most  intimately  ever  since  the 
Trent  question  has  been  under  discussion,1  and 
that  he  has  pressed  upon  him  arbitration."  But, 
though  he  speaks  of  the  President  as  being 
"essentially  honest  and  pacific  in  disposition, 
with  a  natural  slowness,"  he  does  not  give  us  in 
his  published  letters  the  slightest  hint  that  he 
had  heard  him  express  any  opinion  as  to  the 
affair  of  the  Trent. 

1  Life,  iv.  p.  60. 


THE    TRENT.  335 

After  Lincoln's  death  there  was  found  among 
his  papers  the  draft  of  a  letter  proposing  arbi 
tration  as  a  solution  of  the  difficulty.  This  was 
probably  written  under  the  influence  of  the  in 
terviews  in  which  Sumner  urged  this  course.  It 
was  never  submitted  to  the  cabinet,  but  it  is  an 
authentic  piece  of  evidence  in  his  own  hand 
writing,  that  he  was  seriously  considering  this 
aspect  of  the  matter. 

The  intimation  that  there  were  confidential 
interviews  between  the  President  and  Seward  as 
to  this  case,  of  which  no  record  has  been  kept, 
and  the  further  suggestion,  that  the  President 
intimated  to  Seward,  while  he  himself  was  con 
sidering  the  desirableness  of  arbitration,  that,  as 
only  a  few  days  of  the  grace  allowed  by  the 
British  Government  for  our  ultimate  decision  of 
the  matter  remained,  he  should  find  good  diplo 
matic  grounds  for  the  surrender  of  our  pris 
oners,  are  both  gratuitous.  There  is  no  foun 
dation  for  either  of  them.  The  latter  falls  to 
the  ground,  as  neither  the  President  nor  the 
secretary  had  any  knowledge  at  the  time  that 
Lord  Lyons  was  instructed  to  absolutely  require 
his  answer  within  a  limited  period,  much  less 
that  that  period  had  nearly  expired.  The  former 
is  inconsistent  not  only  with  Seward's  own  state 
ment  in  his  letter  to  Weed  already  quoted,  but 
also  with  the  President's  reluctance,  as  shown 


336  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

by  Mr.  Bates,  to  acquiesce  in  the  conclusion  of 
Seward's  dispatch  and  the  surrender  of  the 
prisoners  ;  and  it  is  further  practically  contra 
dicted  by  Seward's  biographer,  who  tells  us  — 
from  his  memorandum  made  at  the  time  —  that 
when  the  cabinet  separated  on  Christmas  day 
after  discussing  Seward's  despatch,  the  Presi 
dent  said  to  him  :  "  Your  answer  states  the 
reasons  why  they  ought  to  be  given  up ;  now 
I  've  a  mind  to  try  my  hand  at  stating  the  rea 
sons  why  they  ought  not  to  be  given  up ;  but 
told  him  the  next  day  that  he  could  not  make 
an  argument  that  satisfied  his  own  mind,  and 
that  this  proved  to  him  that  Seward's  ground 
was  the  right  one." 

The  contemporary  evidence  all  points  one 
way,  —  it  shows  that  Lincoln  took  no  lead  in 
the  decision  of  the  matter,  but  acquiesced,  as 
the  members  of  the  cabinet  did,  in  the  reason 
ing  and  conclusions  of  Seward's  despatch,  con 
vinced,  though  against  his  will,  that  the  result 
that  Seward  had  reached  could  not  be  avoided. 

Seward's  despatch,  whatever  be  its  merits  or 
defects,  is  distinctly  a  technical  document.  It 
has  been  called  an  attorney's  plea.  The  ques 
tion  was  one  of  law,  and  he  properly  treated  it 
as  such.  His  paper  bears  evidence  of  a  most 
careful  and  exhaustive  study  of  the  adjudicated 
cases,  and  of  the  discussions  in  the  text-books 


THE    TRENT.  337 

and  elsewhere  having  any  bearing  on  the  ques 
tion  at  issue ;  the  internal  evidence  as  well  as 
the  historical  facts  show  that,  both  in  its  gen 
eral  scope  and  in  its  details,  it  was  the  work  of 
one  mind,  and  that  Seward's  alone.  The  cabi 
net,  as  we  know,  adopted  it  after  discussion, 
making  only  some  verbal  and  formal  amend 
ments,  and  on  the  same  day  it  was  delivered 
to  Lord  Lyons. 

Before  considering  the  argument  of  the  des 
patch,  a  few  words  on  international  law  and 
the  political  situation  of  the  country  at  that 
time  may  not  be  amiss.  The  sources  of  pub 
lic  international  law  are  to  be  found  in  those 
practices  universally  admitted  and  recognized 
as  legitimate  by  the  usage  of  civilized  nations, 
in  historical  precedents,  and  in  the  decisions  of 
the  prize  courts.  In  every  war  there  are  two 
or  more  belligerents.  Other  countries,  not 
engaged  in  the  war,  are  known  as  neutrals. 
Neutral  nations  naturally  desire,  if  they  are 
commercial  people,  to  have  their  merchantmen 
free  from  liability  to  capture  and  condemnation, 
and  their  trade  with  any  belligerent  as  secure 
and  untrammeled  as  possible.  They  constantly 
endeavor  to  procure  such  mitigations  of  the 
established  rules  of  international  law,  and  such 
liberal  interpretations  of  these  rules  as  will  en 
able  them  to  extend  in  every  way  the  uniformly 


338  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

profitable  commerce  of  neutrals  in  war  time. 
Belligerents,  on  the  other  hand,  if  maritime 
powers,  contend  for  a  strict  construction  and 
rigorous  enforcement  of  these  rules,  in  order 
that  neutral  trading  with  the  enemy  may  be 
reduced  within  the  narrowest  limits. 

From  the  time  of  the  formation  of  our  gov 
ernment  we  had  uniformly  contended  for  the 
largest  extension  of  the  rights  of  neutrals,  for 
in  all  the  European  wars  we  had  been  a  neutral 
nation.  But  now  the  positions  were  reversed. 
We  were  engaged  in  a  contest  for  the  suppres 
sion  of  a  formidable  rebellion;  and  were  em 
ploying  for  that  purpose  all  the  recognized 
methods  of  modern  warfare,  both  on  land  and 
at  sea.  Other  nations  had  declared  the  in 
surrection  a  war,  had  recognized  the  insurgents 
as  belligerents  and  proclaimed  their  own  neu 
trality.  Commercial  intercourse  with  the  insur 
gents  was  of  immense  profit  to  these  nations, 
especially  to  Great  Britain,  and  was  of  vital 
importance  to  the  states  in  rebellion.  We  had 
established  a  blockade  to  put  a  stop  to  this 
commerce.  Whatever  claims  we  might  have 
previously  put  forth  as  neutrals,  we  could  not 
now  afford  to  make  concessions  impairing  any 
right  heretofore  claimed  by  belligerents,  much 
less  any  undisputed  right.  If  Mason  and  Sli- 
dell  were  to  be  surrendered,  care  must  be  taken 


THE    TRENT.  339 

in  stating  the  grounds  for  their  release  that  no 
admission  was  made  and  no  position  taken  which 
in  any  future  contingency  could  be  turned 
against  us. 

The  successful  enforcement  of  our  blockade 
depended  on  the  energy,  vigilance,  and  prompt 
and  courageous  action  of  the  officers  of  our 
navy.  It  had  been  charged  that  these  officers 
were  not  sufficiently  alert  and  watchful.  If  the 
zeal  of  Captain  Wilkes  should  meet  with  any 
thing  like  a  rebuff  or  rebuke,  it  would  certainly 
tend  to  discourage  other  commanders,  and  in 
duce  them  to  slacken  their  exertions,  which  it 
was  important  to  quicken.  The  secretary  of 
the  navy  and  one  branch  of  Congress  had  al 
ready  thanked  Wilkes  for  what  he  had  done  ; 
it  was  most  undesirable  that  anything  should  be 
said  which  could  be  interpreted  as  a  reflection 
upon  their  action.  The  whole  country  had  lav 
ished  on  him  unstinted  praise;  men  of  emi 
nence  and  intelligence,  with  hardly  a  dissenting 
voice,  had  maintained  the  legality  of  his  capture 
and  conduct;  this  universal  outburst  of  patri 
otic  feeling  and  concord  of  public  opinion  were 
not  to  be  rudely  checked  or  wholly  disregarded. 
The  people  did  not  understand  the  military 
exigencies  of  the  situation,  and  they  were  en 
tirely  unprepared  for  the  surrender  of  our  pris 
oners,  —  the  reasons  for  giving  up  the  rebel 


340  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

envoys  must  be  so  put,  that  they  would,  at  the 
same  time,  both  satisfy  the  judgment  and  save 
the  pride  of  the  nation.  To  do  this  was  not  an 
easy  task  ;  but  Se ward's  despatch  met  these  vari 
ous  requirements  so  far  as  possible. 

Lord  Kussell  had  assumed  that  in  what  had 
been  done  we  claimed  to  be  exercising  a  right, 
—  similar  to  that  on  which  Great  Britain  had 
relied  to  justify  her  taking  from  our  vessels 
persons  alleged  to  be  her  seamen,  —  a  sort  of 
ocean  police  for  municipal  purposes  over  vessels 
of  a  foreign  country,  which  would  authorize  any 
belligerent  to  take  from  a  neutral  vessel  rebels, 
criminals,  deserters,  or  even  the  citizens  of  a  hos 
tile  country. 

This  Seward  at  once  disclaimed.  After  re 
citing  the  facts  as  stated  by  Lord  Russell 
and  adding  what  seemed  necessary  to  the  cor 
rect  understanding  of  the  matter,  he  went  on 
to  say  that,  instead  of  being  a  flagrant  act 
of  violence  on  the  part  of  Captain  Wilkes, 
what  he  did  was  undertaken  as  a  simple,  legal, 
and  customary  belligerent  proceeding,  the  ar 
rest  of  a  neutral  vessel  engaged  in  carrying 
contraband  of  war  for  the  use  and  benefit  of 
the  insurgents.  He  then  proceeded  to  enumer 
ate  and  discuss  the  questions  involved.  These 
were,  as  he  stated  them :  Were  the  commis 
sioners  and  their  secretaries  with  their  des- 


THE    TRENT.  341 

patches  contraband  of  war?  —  Could  Captain 
Wilkes  lawfully  stop  and  search  the  vessel 
for  those  persons  and  their  despatches  ?  —  Did 
he  exercise  that  right  in  a  legal  and  proper 
manner?  —  Having  found  the  contraband  per 
sons  on  board  and  in  presumed  possession  of 
the  contraband  despatches,  had  he  a  right  to 
capture  the  persons  ?  If  so,  did  he  exercise  this 
right  in  the  manner  allowed  and  recognized  by 
the  law  of  nations? 

It  was  not  denied  that  persons  in  the  military 
or  naval  service  of  the  enemy  are  contraband. 
The  question  was,  whether  ambassadors,  their 
suites  and  their  despatches  fall  within  the  same 
category.  Mr.  Seward  maintained  the  affirma 
tive,  relying  principally  on  the  opinion  of  an 
eminent  expounder  of  Prize  Law,  Sir  William 
Scott,  judge  of  the  British  Admiralty  Court, 
that:  "You  may  stop  the  ambassador  of  your 
enemy  on  his  passage.  Despatches  are  not  less 
clearly  contraband,  and  their  bearers  fall  under 
the  same  condemnation ;  .  .  .  when  it  is  of 
sufficient  importance  to  the  enemy  that  persons 
shall  be  sent  on  the  public  service  at  the  public 
expense,  it  is  only  reasonable  that  it  should  af 
ford  equal  ground  of  forfeiture  against  a  vessel 
that  it  has  been  let  out  for  a  purpose  so  inti 
mately  connected  with  hostile  operations."  It 
was  contended  by  Mr.  Simmer,  in  his  speech 


342  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

on  the  Trent  case  delivered  in  the  Senate  a  few 
weeks  later,  that  neither  Mason  nor  Slidell, 
not  being  persons  in  the  military  service,  nor 
their  despatches,  were  contraband  of  war.  But 
it  may  be  questioned  whether,  though  neutrals 
might  take  this  ground,  Sir  William  Scott's 
doctrine  may  not  be  defended,  if  not  as  a  uni 
versal  rule,  at  least  as  one  of  limited  applica 
tion.  While  all  despatches  may  not  be  contra 
band,  there  are  some  despatches  which  it  would 
be  an  insult  to  common  sense  not  to  declare 
contraband.  It  would  have  been  a  great  mis 
take  for  Seward  to  have  conceded,  while  we 
were  in  the  midst  of  a  war,  that  under  no  cir 
cumstances  could  the  ambassador  of  a  belli^er- 

O 

ent  and  his  despatches  be  contraband,  —  even 
though  their  successful  transit  in  a  neutral  ves 
sel  might  give  more  aid  and  comfort  to  an  en 
emy  than  many  thousand  stands  of  arms.  The 
right  of  Captain  Wilkes  to  detain  and  search 
the  Trent,  though  she  was  proceeding  from  one 
neutral  port  to  another,  Mr.  Seward  justified  by 
the  maritime  law  as  expounded  by  British  ma 
gistrates  and  uniformly  maintained  by  the  Brit 
ish  Government. 

That  the  right  of  search,  if  it  existed,  was 
exercised  in  a  lawful  and  proper  manner  was 
hardly  disputable,  —  nor,  if  it  were  once  ad 
mitted  that  the  envoys  and  their  despatches 


THE    TRENT.  343 

were  contraband,  was  there  any  question  of  the 
Trent's  liability  to  capture. 

There  remained  only  the  inquiry  whether 
Captain  Wilkes  had  exercised  his  right  of 
capture  in  conformity  with  the  law.  The  law 
requires  that  the  captor  should  bring  the  cap 
tured  vessel  into  a  convenient  port,  and  there 
subject  the  validity  of  her  capture  and  con 
demnation  to  the  adjudication  and  decision  of 
the  proper  admiralty  court.  If  an  overwhelm 
ing  necessity  prevents  his  doing  this,  the  cap 
tor  is  excused,  but  not  otherwise.  In  this 
case,  upon  the  captain's  own  admission,  a  con 
sideration  of  the  derangement  and  disappoint 
ment  it  would  cause  innocent  passengers  had 
operated,  perhaps  more  powerfully  than  any 
other  motive,  in  inducing  him  to  remove  to 
his  own  ship  the  persons  claimed  to  be  con 
traband,  and  to  suffer  the  Trent  to  proceed  on 
her  voyage.  Though  in  so  doing  he  followed 
exactly  the  practice  of  the  British  officers  in 
carrying  off  from  our  merchant  vessels  sailors 
whom,  they  claimed  to  be  British  subjects,  against 
which  we  had  so  often  protested  in  vain ;  yet 
by  converting  his  quarter  deck  into  a  court  of 
law,  and  constituting  himself  a  judge  in  his  own 
case,  he  violated  the  established  rule  that  ques 
tions  of  prize  are  not  to  be  decided  on  the  spot 
by  the  captor,  but  are  to  be  determined  upon 


344  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

a  full  and  impartial  investigation  before  a  com 
petent  and  regularly  organized  judicial  tribunal. 
The  United  States  had  always  insisted  upon 
this  course,  and  had  so  uniformly  protested 
against  just  such  proceedings  as  took  place  in 
this  case,  that  it  was  impossible  for  us  to  admit 
their  sufficiency  and  regularity ;  the  prisoners 
must,  therefore,  be  returned. 

It  was  upon  this  narrow  ground  that  the  sur 
render  of  Mason  and  Slidell  was  determined. 
The  merits  of  this  mode  of  dealing  with  the 
case  were :  that  it  yielded  no  point  of  interna 
tional  law  on  which  we  might  at  any  time  de 
sire  to  rest  a  claim  as  belligerents,  but  made 
the  decision  depend  on  a  doctrine  and  practice 
universally  recognized  in  modern  civilized  war 
fare  as  the  only  lawful  mode  of  treating  a 
prize ;  that  it  gave  due  credit  to  Wilkes  for 
all  the  qualities  which  we  wished  our  naval 
officers  to  cultivate  and  exhibit,  and  only  indi 
rectly  criticised  and  lamented  his  courtesy  and 
leniency  ;  that  it  appeared  to  follow  to  their 
legitimate  conclusion  the  doubts  suggested  by 
the  secretary  of  the  navy  as  to  the  possible  con 
sequences  of  Wilkes's  failure  to  bring  in  the 
Trent;  that  it  showed,  therefore,  that  the  gov 
ernment  had  from  the  outset  been  conscious  of 
the  weak  point  of  the  case,  and  that  its  first 
official  utterance  in  Secretary  Welles's  letter  to 


THE    TRENT.  345 

Captain  Wilkes  was  not  inconsistent  with  the 
final  conclusion  of  the  secretary  of  state. 

As  the  despatch  followed  precisely  the  argu 
ment,  and  reached  precisely  the  conclusions  of 
the  British  crown  lawyers,  on  exactly  the 
grounds  on  which  they  relied,  though  this  was 
not  then  known  to  us,  it  weakened  any  criti 
cism  on  the  part  of  the  British  government. 
From  the  whole  transaction  we  gained  this  ad 
vantage  —  that  the  surrendering  of  these  men 
so  promptly  and  with  so  little  discussion  made 
both  the  ministry  and  the  people  of  Eng 
land  ashamed  of  their  violence  and  haste ;  and 
Messrs.  Mason  and  Slidell  instead  of  being 
England's  heroes  became  her,  and  not  our, 
"white  elephants."  They  were  quietly  taken 
early  one  winter  morning  from  Fort  Warren 
to  Provincetown,  where  they  were  delivered 
on  board  the  British  frigate  Kinaldo.  They 
arrived  in  England,  January  29,  1862.  For 
seven  weeks  they  had  been  heroes ;  but  the 
tide  was  already  running  against  them,  and  the 
English  did  not  require  the  encouragement  of 
the  "  Times  "  to  "  let  the  fellows  alone." 

When  exactly  what  Captain  Wilkes  had  done 
was  known  in  England,  the  law  officers  of  the 
crown  were  again  consulted.  Somewhat  modi 
fying  their  former  opinions,  they  then  advised 
the  ministry,  that  enemy's  despatches  and  their 


346  "  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

bearers  were  contraband ;  but  that  if  the  des 
patches  were  so  successfully  concealed  as  to  es 
cape  discovery  and  seizure,  the  bearer,  whether 
an  ambassador  or  any  other  person,  could  no 
longer  be  taken. 

In  his  original  demand  Lord  Russell  had  made 
no  allusion  to  the  supposed  diplomatic  charac 
ter  of  Mason  and  Slidell.  The  complaint  of  the 
British  government  was  simply  that  one  of  our 
cruisers  had  forcibly  stopped  a  neutral  vessel 
on  an  innocent  voyage,  and  taken  from  her  two 
persons.  In  his  reply  to  Mr.  Seward,  written 
after  the  surrender  of  the  prisoners,  Lord  Rus 
sell  denied  that  ambassadors  were  contraband 
of  war  subjecting  the  vessel  to  seizure.  Mr. 
Seward,  as  has  been  stated,  had  maintained  the 
contrary.  The  case  therefore  leaves  that  ques 
tion  exactly  as  it  was  before. 

The  surrender  of  our  prisoners  being  placed 
upon  the  well  settled  rule,  that  a  captor  cannot 
take  out  of  a  prize  either  persons  or  property 
as  contraband  without  bringing  in  the  vessel  for 
adjudication,  unless  he  is  necessarily  prevented 
from  so  doing,  the  decision  settled  in  this  re 
spect  no  new  principle  of  international  law.  But 
Lord  Russell  persisted  in  his  original  conten 
tion,  that  a  belligerent  cannot  on  any  pretense 
take  persons  out  of  a  neutral  vessel,  thus  not 


THE    TRENT.  347 

merely  admitting  but  insisting  on  what  we,  as 
a  nation,  had  claimed  for  years ;  this  doctrine, 
therefore,  for  which  we  had  so  long  contended 
in  vain,  must  now  be  considered  an  established 
rule  of  international  law.1 

1  Dana's  Wheaton,  p.  648,  note. 


CHAPTER   XIX. 

INTERVENTION.  —  CABINET   DIFFICULTIES.  - 
EMANCIPATION. 

FROM  the  time  that  Seward  learned  that 
France  had  invited  both  England  and  Russia  to 
act  in  concert  with  her  as  to  our  affairs,  and 
that,  though  Eussia  had  declined,  England  had 
agreed  to  do  so,  he  was  very  uneasy  as  to  the 
possible  consequences.  He  feared  that  this  ar 
rangement  might  lead  to  offers  of  mediation, 
and,  if  these  were  not  accepted  by  our  govern 
ment,  to  a  recognition  of  the  independence  of  the 
South,  if  not  to  more  positive  intervention  on  its 
behalf."  He  was  not  aware  that  M.  Mercier,  the 
French  minister  to  this  country,  had  already  in 
March  (1861)  advised  the  Emperor  to  recognize 
the  Confederacy,  and  two  months  later  had  re 
commended  the  raising  of  the  blockade  ;  nor  did 
he  know  that  in  October  of  that  year,  when  our 
summer's  campaign  had  ended  in  disaster,  there 
had  been  a  correspondence  between  the  British 
secretary  of  state  for  foreign  affairs  and  the 
prime  minister,  in  which  Earl  Russell  had  writ 
ten  to  Lord  Palmerston,  that  while  it  would  not 


INTER  VENT  I  ON.  349 

do  for  England  and  France  to  break  a  blockade 
for  the  sake  of  getting  cotton,  yet  he  felt  sure 
that  France  would  join  England  in  saying  to 
both  North  and  South,  as  had  often  been  said 
to  European  belligerents,  "  Make  up  your  quar 
rels  ;  we  propose  fair  terms  of  pacification  ;  if 
your  adversary  accepts  them,  and  you  do  not, 
you  must  expect  to  see  us  your  enemies."  To 
which  Palmerston  had  answered  that  the  best 
policy  for  Great  Britain  was  to  go  on  as  she  had 
begun,  and  keep  quite  clear  of  the  conflict.  Sew- 
ard  had  at  the  time  no  knowledge  of  these  occur 
rences,  but  the  discussions  in  Parliament,  the  gen 
eral  tone  of  the  foreign  press,  his  information  as 
to  the  activity  and  persistent  efforts  of  Jefferson 
Davis's  emissaries  both  in  France  and  England, 
and  the  letters  of  our  ministers,  made  him  keenly 
alive  to  the  constantly  increasing  danger  of  some 
such  movement  on  the  part  of  these  countries  as 
had  now  been  proposed. 

To  correct  the  representations  of  the  Southern 
agents  and  counteract  their  influence,  he  deter 
mined  to  send  abroad  some  gentlemen  without 
official  position,  who,  through  the  press,  and  by 
social  intercourse  with  as  many  different  circles 
and  classes  of  people  as  possible,  as  well  as  with 
the  leaders  of  public  opinion,  might  produce 
more  favorable  impressions  of  our  situation  and 
prospects.  Accordingly,  in  October  of  this  year, 


350  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

before  the  incident  of  the  Trent,  he  dispatched 
for  this  purpose,  with  the  President's  sanction, 
Archbishop  Hughes,  the  distinguished  Roman 
Catholic  prelate  of  New  York,  —  whose  posi 
tion  especially  fitted  him  for  such  a  mission  in 
France,  —  Bishop  Mcllvaine  of  the  Protestant 
Episcopal  Church,  and  with  them  his  own  inti 
mate  friend,  the  veteran  politician  and  editor, 
Thuiiow  Weed.  Their  presence  in  Europe  was 
an  advantage  to  us  in  the  storm  that  arose  on 
the  news  of  the  capture  of  Mason  and  Slidell ; 
for  though  they  had  no  knowledge  of  this  matter 
that  was  not  possessed  by  everybody,  they  were 
able,  and  especially  Mr.  Weed  from  his  intimacy 
with  Seward,  to  contradict  the  stories  which  were 
widely  circulated  and  eagerly  believed,  that  the 
secretary  had  the  utmost  animosity  to  Great 
Britain,  and  a  serious  purpose  of  bringing  on  a 
war  between  the  two  countries. 

The  affair  of  the  Trent  absorbed  for  a  time 
the  entire  attention  of  the  British  ministry  and 
public.  After  our  surrender  of  the  rebel  com 
missioners  no  further  demands  upon  us  from 
England  were  expected  for  the  moment.  But  a 
despatch  from  the  French  minister  for  foreign 
affairs,  received  at  the  beginning  of  the  new 
year,  showed  conclusively  the  extent  of  the 
arrangement  between  the  two  countries,  and 
that,  though  neither  the  honor  nor  the  interests 


INTERVENTION.  351 

of  France  were  in  any  way  affected  by  Captain 
Wilkes's  conduct,  yet  the  Emperor  was  prepared 
to  make  the  quarrel  his  own,  and  that  we  should 
have  had  both  countries  to  contend  with  had 
there  been  a  rupture  between  us  and  England. 

When  the  case  of  the  Trent  was  disposed  of, 
our  foreign  ministers,  while  expressing  their 
satisfaction  at  the  temporary  relief  which  this 
gave  them,  wrote  Seward  that  nothing  but  very 
marked  evidence  of  progress  toward  success 
would  restrain  for  any  length  of  time  the  hos 
tile  tendencies  of  England,  which  this  affair  had 
developed.  Fortunately  for  us,  the  New  Year 
opened  with  a  series  of  successful  movements. 
Important  points  on  the  Southern  coast  were 
one  after  another  taken  and  occupied  by  United 
States  troops,  and  New  Orleans  was  captured. 
In  the  West  and  Southwest  a  succession  of 
victories  restored  to  the  government's  control 
large  portions  of  several  of  the  states  which 
the  Confederacy  had  claimed  as  its  own.  It 
needed  only  the  capture  of  Vicksburg,  which 
then  seemed  close  at  hand,  to  open  the  free 
navigation  of  the  Mississippi  and  cut  the  Con 
federacy  in  two. 

During  the  whole  war  Seward  had  the  habit 
of  writing  from  time  to  time  to  our  foreign 
ministers  accounts  of  the  military  situation,  as 
well  of  our  losses  as  of  our  gains :  and  these 


352  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

accounts,  though  colored  by  his  natural  optimism, 
and   strenuously    cheerful    when  our   prospects 
seemed  gloomiest,  give  excellent  general  descrip 
tions  of  the  important  military  movements  and 
situations.     He  had  protested  strongly  against 
the  recognition  of  the  South  as  belligerents,  and 
now,  encouraged  by  our  achievements  and  pros 
pects,  he  exerted  all  his  powers  of  argument  and 
persuasion  to  induce  the  European  governments 
to  withdraw  this  concession.       But  France  de 
clined  to  retract,  upon  the  ground  that  it  would 
be  shabby  to  deprive  the  South,  when  it  seemed 
weak,  of  the  assurance  that  had  been  given  when 
it  appeared  strong  ;  and  England  also  refused, 
giving  as  her  reason  that,  although  our  immediate 
success  then  seemed  probable,  it  would  be  better 
to  wait  until  the  victory  had  been  actually  won. 
The  Northern  gains  in  the  early  months  of 
1862  were  followed  by  a  series  of  reverses.    The 
advance  011  Richmond,  for  which  such  enormous 
preparations  had  been  made,  terminated  in  the 
withdrawal  of  the  Union  troops,  after  a  series  of 
bloody  and  destructive  battles.     The  Confeder 
ates  moved  forward  both  in  the  East  and  West, 
not    merely  with   the   purpose    of   repossessing 
themselves  of    the  places    they  had   heretofore 
occupied  but  of    actually  invading  the  North. 
They  were  at   first   successful.      At   the  West 
the  Northern  troops  retreated  in  Kentucky  and 


INTERVENTION.  353 

Tennessee,  the  Confederates  advanced,  and  Ohio 
was  seriously  threatened ;  in  the  East  the  South 
ern  forces  fought  their  way  through  Virginia, 
and  actually  invaded  Maryland.  They  were 
driven  back  at  Antietam,  and  compelled  to  re 
treat.  Their  forward  movement  in  the  West 
was  checked,  and  there  also  they  were  obliged 
to  withdraw.  Before  this  was  known  in  Eng 
land,  when  only  the  news  of  the  Confederate 
successes  had  reached  there,  it  was  agreed  by 
Lord  Palmerston  and  Lord  Russell  in  the  early 
autumn  of  1862,  that  the  proper  moment  for  in 
tervention  had  arrived,  and  that,  if  the  United 
States  declined  the  proposed  mediation,  the 
Southern  Confederacy  should  be  recognized  as 
an  independent  nation.  A  little  later,  a  min 
isterial  circular  was  prepared,  describing  the 
result  of  the  summer's  campaign,  and  setting 
forth  these  views ;  but  before  the  whole  cabinet 
met,  towards  the  end  of  October,  it  was  evident 
that  the  scheme  for  recognition  had  failed ;  the 
tide  was  setting  against  mediation  ;  the  Southern 
victories  were  seen  to  be  barren  of  results,  and 
the  opinion  was  gradually  gaining  ground  that 
the  superior  resources  and  population  of  the 
United  States  would  enable  it  eventually  to  sub 
due  the  rebellion. 

In  November  of  the  same  year  the  French 
Emperor  proposed  to  both  England  and  Russia 


354  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

to  join  with  him  in  offering  to  arrange  terms 
of  peace.  Both  countries  declined  to  do  so  and 
he  made  the  proposition  alone.  It  was  com 
municated  to  Mr.  Seward  early  in  February, 
1863,  at  a  moment  of  great  discouragement ;  to 
the  failure  of  our  summer  campaign  had  been 
added  the  disaster  of  Fredericksburg  and  the 
political  defeat  of  the  administration  in  the  No 
vember  elections  ;  and  under  these  disheartening 
circumstances  Seward  wrote  his  reply,  refusing 
the  offered  mediation.  His  letter  is  remarka 
ble  for  its  dignity  and  courage,  for  its  forcible 
presentation  of  the  situation  in  which  the  insur 
rection  found  us,  and  of  what  had  been  done 
to  insure  success,  and  for  the  absolute  reliance 
which  it  shows  on  the  patriotism  of  the  people 
and  their  determination,  at  whatever  cost,  to 
maintain  the  Union  in  its  integrity. 

"  This  government,"  he  wrote,  "  has  not  the 
least  thought  of  relinquishing  the  trust  which 
has  been  confided  to  it  by  the  nation  under 
the  most  solemn  of  all  political  sanctions ;  and 
if  it  had  any  such  thought,  it  would  still  have 
abundant  reason  to  know  that  peace  proposed 
at  the  cost  of  dissolution  would  be  immediately, 
unreservedly  and  indignantly  rejected  by  the 
American  people.*  It  is  a  great  mistake  that 
European  statesmen  make,  if  they  suppose  this 
people  are  demoralized.  Whatever,  in  the  case 


INTERVENTION.  355 

of  an  insurrection,  the  people  of  France  would 
do  to  save  their  national  existence,  no  matter 
how  the  strife  might  be  regarded  by,  or  might 
affect,  foreign  nations,  just  so  much,  and  cer 
tainly  no  less,  the  people  of  the  United  States 
will  do.  If  those  now  exercising  their  power 
should,  through  fear  or  faction,  fall  below  this 
height  of  the  national  virtue,  they  would  be 
speedily,  yet  constitutionally,  replaced  by  others 
of  sterner  character  and  patriotism." 

No  further  suggestion  of  mediation  was  ever 
made.  But  apprehensions  of  some  form  of  for 
eign  interference,  especially  from  Great  Britain, 
were  felt  from  time  to  time  till  nearly  the  close 
of  the  war.  It  was  only  on  the  24th  of  March, 
1865,  ten  days  before  our  troops  entered  Kich- 
mond,  that  Mr.  Adams  was  able  to  state  with 
confidence  that  "  no  further  apprehension  need 
be  felt  by  us  of  any  aggressive  policy  "  on  the 
other  side  of  the  Atlantic  ocean. 

Aside  from  the  grave  questions  connected 
with  the  war,  the  diplomatic  events  of  the 
eighteen  months  after  the  surrender  of  Mason 
and  Slidell,  in  which  Seward  found  the  greatest 
satisfaction,  were  a  treaty  with  Great  Britain  for 
the  "  extirpation  of  the  African  slave  trade  at 
once  and  forever,"  l  and  the  opening  of  diplo 
matic  intercourse  with  Hayti  and  Liberia, 
i  April  8,  1862. 


356  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

In  the  summer  of  1862,  when  the  army  before 
Richmond  seemed  too  reduced  for  any  effective 
movement,  Seward  left  Washington,  carrying 
with  him  a  letter  from  the  President,  intended 
to  supplement  his  own  personal  efforts  with  the 
loyal  governors  and  leading  men  at  the  North, 
to  induce  them  to  urge  the  administration  to 
issue  a  fresh  call  for  troops.  The  President  could 
have  made  such  a  call  without  being  asked ;  but 
the  military  situation  was  critical,  our  prospects 
were  gloomy,  and  he  feared  that  if  he  did  so 
"  a  general  panic  and  stampede  would  follow." 
Seward  did  his  work  successfully.  Soon  after 
his  return  to  Washington,  he  was  called  upon  by 
Mr.  Seaton,  the  editor  of  the  "  National  Intel 
ligencer,"  who  began  the  conversation  in  this 
way :  "  Now  really,  governor,  this  is  a  time  to 
say  something."  Seward  began  to  speak  of  the 
need  of  reinforcements,  and  the  promptness  with 
which  they  were  arriving  ;  but,  either  induced 
by  what  Mr.  Seaton  said,  or  guessing  the  object 
of  his  visit,  he  turned  to  personal  matters,  and 
added  that  "  Every  rumor  of  a  division  of  coun 
sels,  and  of  a  conflict  about  generals,  tended  to 
defeat  this  (the  arrival  of  reinforcements)  ;  that 
he  therefore  felt  at  liberty  to  state  that  he  had 
never  exercised  a  power  or  duty  in  the  progress 
of  the  war  with  -which  he  was  not  specially 
charged  by  the  President,  and  in  the  perform- 


CABINET   DIFFICULTIES.  357 

ance  'of  which  he  was  not  always  in  free  com 
munication  with  him.  That  to  no  one  had  he 
ever  expressed  distrust  of  the  President,  or  of 
any  of  his  associates  in  the  government;  but 
on  the  contrary  had  uniformly  supported  them. 
That  he  had  not  been  quick  or  willing  to  enter 
tain  complaints  against  any  general,  but  had 
exerted  his  best  endeavors  to  sustain  them  all. 
That  he  had  never  introduced  or  encouraged  in 
the  cabinet  any  test  question  concerning  men  or 
measures ;  had  never  seen  any  intemperance  of 
debate  there ;  nor  had  one  word  of  unkindness 
or  distrust  ever  passed  between  the  President  or 
any  of  his  official  advisers  and  himself." 

This  interview  shows  not  only  that  the  charges 
against  Seward,  which  came  to  a  head  in  Decem 
ber  of  this  same  year  in  the  action  of  a  caucus 
of  senators  requesting  his  removal,  were  in  July 
the  gossip  of  Washington,  but  also  that  they 
were  perfectly  well  known  to  him  at  that  time, 
and  that  he  understood  their  object ;  for  he  went 
on  to  say  that  he  was  "  content  to  remain  where 
he  was  so  long  as  the  war  continued  and  the 
President  required  it;  but  would  not  prolong 
his  stay  one  hour  beyond  the  time  when  the 
President  should  think  it  wise  to  relieve  "  him. 

It  was  to  Seward  a  summer  of  intense  anxiety. 
Continued  defeats  were  likely  to  bring  on  a 
recognition  of  the  independence  of  the  Southern 


358  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

Confederacy,  which  must  be  either  acquiesced  in 
or  met  by  war.  To  avert  the  defeats,  "  what 
could  we  do  but  to  push  recruiting,  and,  that 
failing,  to  provide  for  a  draft  ?  "  "  I  go  to  Con 
gress  and  implore  and  conjure  them,"  he  writes 
to  his  wife.  "  They  give  me  debates  upon  the 
errors  of  the  past,  and  quarrels  about  who  is  to 
blame.  These  disputes  involve  policies  about 
dealing  with  slaves,  upon  which  Congress  angers 
itself  and  the  country ;  and  the  Governors  of  the 
states  write,  '  You  can  get  no  recruits.'  I  ask 
Congress  to  authorize  a  draft.  They  fall  into 
altercation  about  letting  slaves  fight  and  work. 
Every  day  is  a  day  lost,  and  every  day  lost  is  a 
hazard  to  the  country."  The  letter  shows  that 
his  relations  with  Congress  were  at  this  time  not 
altogether  harmonious.  A  despatch  of  the  same 
month  to  Mr.  Adams  gives  us  a  further  insight 
into  his  state  of  mind :  — 

"  It  seems  as  if  the  extreme  advocates  of 
African  slavery  and  its  most  vehement  oppo 
nents  were  acting  in  concert  together  to  precipi 
tate  a  servile  war,  —  the  former  by  making  the 
most  desperate  attempt  to  overthrow  the  Federal 
Union,  the  latter  by  demanding  an  edict  of  uni 
versal  emancipation  as  a  lawful  and  necessary, 
if  not,  as  they  say,  the  only  legitimate  way  of 
saving  the  Union." 

As  an  official  despatch,  this  communication 


CABINET  DIFFICULTIES.  359 

was  unwise,  if  not  unjustifiable,  and  was  not 
helped  by  the  word  "  confidential  "  at  the  top. 
It  was  really  no  despatch,  but   a  private,  per 
sonal  letter,  expressing  strongly  a  feeling  then 
quite  prevalent  in  parts  of  the  country,  which 
Seward   might   fairly    enough   have   held,    and 
which    he  had  a  perfect  right  to  communicate 
in  private  correspondence  to  a  friend.     His  own 
object   at   this  time  was   to  secure,  as  soon  as 
possible,  a  victory  which  should  be  to  Europe 
a  demonstration  of  the  certainty  of  our  ultimate 
success.     For  this  troops  were  needed,  and  every 
day  occupied  by  Congress  in  discussing  political 
problems,  instead  of  taking  measures  to  fill  up 
our  armies,  was,  to   his  mind,  a  day  lost  to  us. 
He  knew  that   each  day  so  lost   increased  the 
chances  of  foreign   intervention.      He   thought 
that  the  questions  as  to  slavery  might  wait,  but 
that  our  successes  could  not  do  so  ;  and  he  was 
impatient  of  anything  which  might  endanger  or 
delay  them.     Before    the  meeting  of   Congress 
this  despatch  had  become  public.      Mr.  Lincoln 
said  that  it  had  not  been  submitted  to  him.     It 
made  no  reference  whatever  to  either  the  House 
or  Senate,  and  no  allusion  to  Congress.     Seward 
spoke  of  "  the   extreme    advocates  of  slavery  " 
and  of  "  its  most  vehement  opponents."     These 
terms  described  classes,  not  Congressmen  ;  nev 
ertheless   the  radical  anti-slavery  senators   and 


360  WILLIAM  UENRY  SEWARD. 

representatives  were  indignant  at  what  they  chose 
to  consider  an  affront  offered  them  by  a  cabinet 
minister  in  an  official  document  written  without 
the  knowledge  of  the  President. 

When  the  session  began  in  December,  every 
one  was  blue  about  the  military  situation,  and 
the  Republicans  very  sore  at  the  results  of  the 
November  elections.  The  administration  had 
lost  everywhere.  New  York,  Seward's  own  state, 
had  elected  as  governor  a  peace  Democrat ;  and 
had  the  new  Congress  met  at  once,  some  peace 
would  probably  have  been  patched  up,  either  with 
or  without  foreign  intervention.  The  change 
in  the  popular  vote  was  to  be  attributed  largely 
to  the  failure  of  our  military  operations  at  the 
East.  There  was  a  general  feeling  that  the  ad 
ministration  was  mainly  responsible  for  this,  by 
its  interference  with,  and  mismanagement  of, 
the  conduct  of  the  war.  Some  people  thought 
our  misfortunes  were  owing  to  the  fact  that  the 
government  had  intrusted  important  commands 
to  officers  who  had  not  decided  anti-slavery  opin 
ions,  and  were  not,  therefore,  it  was  charged, 
thoroughly  in  earnest  in  their  work.  It  was  evi 
dent  that  the  emancipation  proclamation,  which 
is  presently  to  be  spoken  of,  had  further  divided, 
instead  of  uniting  the  people.  The  nation  had 
given  a  distinct  vote  of  want  of  confidence  ;  and 
the  Republican  senators  wished  to  regain  the 


CABINET  DIFFICULTIES.  361 

popular  favor.  They  assumed  that  Seward  had 
been  the  controlling  mind  in  the  administration, 
the  Premier,  in  the  talk  of  the  day ;  that  he  was 
practically  responsible  for  its  domestic  as  well 
as  its  foreign  policy,  for  all  its  mistakes  'and 
misfortunes,  civil,  political,  and  military,  and 
had  dominated,  in  a  heterogeneous  and  discord 
ant  cabinet,  even  the  President  himself. 

It  is  idle  to  speculate  upon  the  origin  or 
causes  of  this  opinion.  It  is  enough  that  it  ex 
isted  at  the  time,  and  was  not  confined  to  Con 
gress.  It  is  not  easy  to  find  any  foundation  for 
it.  From  the  time  that  supplies  were  ordered 
to  Sumter  to  the  close  of  his  life,  Lincoln  was 
the  head  of  his  own  government,  and  Seward 
recognized  it.  "  There  is  but  one  vote  in  the 
cabinet,"  he  said,  "  and  that  is  cast  by  the  Pres 
ident."  "  The  President  is  the  best  of  us  all," 
he  wrote  to  his  wife  in  June,  1861.  Lincoln 
listened  to  Seward's  opinions,  as  he  did  to  those 
of  the  other  members  of  his  cabinet,  but  the 
decision  was  always  his  own ;  if  anybody  inter 
fered  with  the  military  operations  and  the  dis 
position  of  the  troops,  it  was  the  President  and 
secretary  of  war,  not  Seward. 

It  was  thought,  however,  that  some  change 
must  be  made ;  and  acting  on  their  preconceived 
notions,  a  caucus  of  Republican  senators  voted 
by  a  small  majority  to  request  the  President 


362  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

"  to  dispense  with  the  services  of  the  secretary 
of  state."  Believing  that  their  object  might  be 
equally  well  attained  by  a  resolve  less  personal, 
supported  by  a  larger  majority,  the  caucus  on 
the  following  day  adopted,  with  only  one  dissent 
ing  voice,  a  substitute,  recommending  the  Presi 
dent  to  partially  remodel  his  cabinet,  and  ap 
pointed  a  committee  of  nine,  —  six  radicals  and 
three  conservatives,  —  to  wait  on  him  and  pre 
sent  this  resolution.  That  there  might  be  no 
doubt  as  to  the  object  of  the  resolve,  eight  of 
these  nine  committeemen  were  known  to  think 
"  Seward  a  serious  obstacle  to  the  prosecution 
of  the  war."  Seward,  learning  of  the  doings  of 
the  caucus,  anticipated  the  action  of  the  com 
mittee  by  sending  in  his  resignation.  Chase  dis 
approved  the  action  of  the  caucus  ;  he  was  unwil 
ling  to  be  a  party  to  an  attack  upon  Seward, 
and  finding  the  reason  given  by  the  senators  for 
their  action  broad  enough  to  extend  to  all  the 
members  of  the  cabinet,  he  also  sent  in  his  resig 
nation.  The  whole  thing  disturbed  Lincoln  ;  he 
was  displeased  with  the  attempt  at  congressional 
dictation,  and  greatly  annoyed  at  the  inability 
to  grasp  the  situation  which  the  proceeding  dis 
played.  Seward  and  Chase  represented  the  op 
posite  extremes  of  the  Republican  party,  and  it 
was  necessary  that  he  should  have  in  his  cab 
inet  the  support  of  both.  He  was  relieved  from 


EMANCIPATION.  363 

all  embarrassment  on  that  score  when  he  re 
ceived  Chase's  resignation,  and,  one  might  almost 
say,  ordered  them  both  to  go  back  at  once  to 
their  posts,  because  the  public  good  required  it. 
Speaking  of  the  matter  a  year  later,  he  said  : 
"  If  I  had  yielded  to  that  storm  and  dismissed 
Seward,  the  thing  would  have  slumped  over  one 
way,  and  we  should  have  been  left  to  a  scanty 
handful  of  supporters." 

As  our  armies  advanced  into  the  seceding 
states,  the  questions  of  the  effect  of  the  war 
upon  the  slaves  found  within  our  lines,  as  well  as 
upon  slavery  itself,  became  of  constantly  increas 
ing  interest  and  importance.  General  Butler's 
ingenious  application  of  the  term  "  contraband  " 
to  the  slaves  coming  within  our  lines,  was  of 
great  service  in  solving  the  former  :  but  the  lat 
ter,  the  vital  question  of  slavery  or  emancipa 
tion,  still  remained,  and  upon  this  there  were 
great  differences  of  opinion.  There  were  many 
persons,  not  necessarily  radicals,  who,  looking 
at  the  matter  only  from  a  moral  point  of  view, 
considered  constitutional  scruples  wholly  idle, 
that  if  slavery  were  not  abolished  the  war  would 
be  not  merely  a  crime  but  a  blunder,  and  that 
public  proclamation  of  immediate  emancipation 
should  be  made  at  once,  without  regard  to  con 
sequences,  and  however  ineffectual  it  might  in 
fact  be.  Our  foreign  ministers  —  while  they 


364  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

thought  military  successes  essential,  if  we  would 
prevent  the  recognition  of  the  South  by  the 
governments  of  Europe  —  admitted  that  a  pro 
clamation  of  emancipation,  which  should  give 
to  the  war  the  aspect  of  a  crusade  against  slav 
ery,  might  be  of  advantage  to  us ;  and  some  of 
them  were  urgent  that  this  proclamation  should 
be  made  at  once. 

At  home  those  persons  who  believed  in  the 
supremacy  of  the  Constitution,  and  that  the 
maintenance  of  the  Union  was  the  object  of  the 
war  and  its  only  justification,  were  in  a  state  of 
great  doubt  both  as  to  the  duty  and  the  powers 
of  the  Federal  government.  Many  of  them,  as 
the  war  went  on,  had  come  gradually  to  the  con 
viction  that  it  must  end  in  the  abolition  of  slav 
ery,  and  that  the  struggle  would  be  futile  or 
worse,  if  in  the  result  this  cause  for  sectional 
strife  should  not  disappear  forever;  yet  they 
saw  no  ground  for  the  government's  interference 
with  slavery  in  any  state,  except  as  a  military 
necessity  for  the  purpose  of  more  quickly  and 
successfully  putting  down  the  rebellion.  They 
were  very  doubtful  whether  an  emancipation  pro 
clamation  would  have  this  effect,  —  whether  it 
would  not  more  strongly  unite  and  give  fresh 
courage  to  the  South,  while  it  would  bring  into 
opposition  to  the  government  all  those  elements 
at  the  North,  which,  united  in  their  support  of 


EMANCIPATION.  365 

a  war  for  the  Constitution,  were  more  or  less  in 
different  to  slavery ;  and  whether  it  would  not, 
by  thus  dividing  the  Northern  people,  make  the 
successful  prosecution  of  the  war  no  longer  pos 
sible  ;  or  in  other  words,  whether  it  would  not 
add  an  enemy  in  the  rear  to  those  already  in 
the  field. 

His  own  doubts  upon  this  point,  and  his  con 
viction  that  he  had  no  right  to  convert  the  war 
into  a  crusade   against  slavery,  had   made   the 
President    hesitate   long.     As   he    declared    in 
words  often  quoted  :   "  My  paramount  object  in 
this  struggle  is  to  save  the  Union,  and  is  not 
either  to  save  or  to  destroy  slavery.     If  I  could 
save  the    Union    without   freeing   any    slave,  I 
would  do  it ;  and  if  I  could  save  it  by  freeing 
all  the  slaves,  I  would  do  it ;  and  if  I  could  save 
it  by  freeing  some  and  leaving  others  alone,  I 
would  also  do  that.     What  I  do  about  slavery 
and  the  colored  race,  I  do  because  I  believe  it 
helps  to  save  the  Union  ;  and  what  I  forbear,  I 
forbear  because  I  do  not  believe  it  would  help 
to  save  the  Union.     I  shall  do  less  whenever  I 
shall  believe  what  I  am  doing  hurts  the  cause, 
and   I  shall  do  more  whenever  I  shall  believe 
doing  more  will  help  the  cause." 

More  than  a  month,  however,  before  he  wrote 
this  letter,  he  had  submitted  to  his  cabinet  the 
draft  of  an  emancipation  proclamation.  The 


366  WILLIAM    HENRY  SEWARD. 

discussion   which   followed    showed    that   there 
was  between  the  secretaries  the  same  difference 
of  opinion  that  existed  among  the  people.     The 
attorney-general    and  Stanton  favored  the    im 
mediate  issuing  of  this  proclamation ;  the  secre 
tary  of  the  navy  was  silent ;  Mr.   Chase  said  it 
was  a  measure   of  great  danger,  would  lead  to 
universal   emancipation,   and  went  far   beyond 
anything  he  had  recommended ;  and  Mr.  Blair 
prophesied  that    it  would  cost  the    administra 
tion  the  next  elections.     Nothing  was  said,  how 
ever,  that  affected  the  President's  decision,  until 
Seward  suggested  &  That  the  depression  of  the 
public   mind,    in    consequence    of   our  repeated 
reverses,  was  so  great  that  this  might  be  consid 
ered  the  last  resource  of  an  exhausted  govern 
ment,  a  cry  for  help,  the  government  stretching 
forth  its  hands  to  Ethiopia,  instead  of  Ethiopia 
stretching  forth  her  hands  to  the  government ; 
and  that  the  proclamation  had  better  be  post 
poned  until  it  could  be  supported  by  military 
successes,  instead  of  coming  upon  the  heel  of 
great  disasters/  The  wisdom  of  this  struck  Mr. 
Lincoln  so  forcibly,  that  he  put  the  paper  away, 
and  waited  till  our  partial  victory  at  Antietam 
had,  to  some  extent,  redeemed  the  failures  of  the 
summer.     The    proclamation  was  then  issued; 
and  when  the  days  of  grace  which  it  gave  to  the 
seceding  slaveholders  had  expired,  its  assurances 


EMANCIPA  TION.  36 i 


were  fulfilled.  As  our  armies  advanced,  the 
government  in  all  its  branches  recognized  and 
maintained  the  freedom  which  the  proclamation 
promised,  and  the  interests  of  humanity  became 
identified  with  the  cause  of  the  country. 


CHAPTER  XX. 

DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE  WAR. 

WHEN  Lincoln  entered  upon  the  duties  of  his 
office  the  troops  at  his  command  were  too  few 
to  permit  him  to  even  consider  the  question  of 
properly  reinforcing  and  holding  Fort  Sumter. 
Our  navy  consisted  of  forty-two  ships  fit  for 
immediate  service,  thirty  of  which  were  dispersed 
in  different  parts  of  the  world,  leaving  only 
twelve  for  use  at  home.  To  suppress  the  rebel 
lion  took  us  four  years.  At  its  close  we  had 
an  army  of  a  million  men,  and  a  navy  of  nearly 
six  hundred  ships,  seventy-five  of  which  were 
ironclads.  It  was,  of  course,  impossible  that  a 
contest  of  this  magnitude,  as  to  which  the  great 
European  powers  had  proclaimed  their  neutrality 
almost  before  it  began,  could  be  carried  on  by 
sea  and  land  for  so  long  a  period  without  giving 
rise  to  an  infinite  number  and  variety  of  diplo 
matic  questions  and  complaints.  The  published 
correspondence  of  the  State  Department  for  this 
period  fills  thirteen  volumes  ;  the  mere  enumer 
ation  of  the  matters  treated  of  would  be  ex 
tremely  tedious.  It  may  be  said  in  general,  that 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      369 

Seward  claimed  for  us  as  belligerents  the  fullest 
exercise  of  all  the  rights  upon  which  Great 
Britain  had  insisted  when  at  war ;  but  that, 
without  waiving  these,  he  at  times  made  conces 
sions  for  the  purpose  of  relieving  the  tension 
between  this  country  and  the  leading  European 
powers,  and  of  diminishing  if  possible  the  hostile 
feelings  of  their  citizens.  His  mode  of  dealing 
with  the  mails  found  on  captured  blockade  run 
ners  is  an  illustration  of  this. 

These  vessels  often  had  mails  on  board ;  the 
question  of  the  disposition  to  be  made  of  these 
was  important  and  troublesome,  and  involved  a 
good  deal  of  feeling.  Should  we  open  them 
and  examine  their  contents  ?  They  might  con 
tain  official  despatches  or  private  letters  having 
important  information  ;  but,  to  ascertain  this,  it 
would  be  necessary  to  pry  into  domestic  letters 
of  a  strictly  personal  character.  Was  this  per 
mitted  by  the  laws  of,  war  ?  The  governments 
under  whose  flags  these  vessels  sailed,  insisted 
that  the  mail  bags  should  be  forwarded  un 
opened  to  their  destination  ;  our  navy  depart 
ment  contended  that  they  were  liable  like  the 
cargo  to  examination  for  contraband.  Seward, 
after  some  consideration,  agreed  that  the  public 
mails  of  any  friendly  or  neutral  power  should 
be  forwarded  unopened.  The  secretary  of  the 
navy  thought  this  a  weak  yielding  to  an  unrea- 


370  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

sonable  demand.  Seward  made  the  concession 
not  as  a  matter  of  right,  but  of  expediency,  and 
was  unquestionably  wise  in  so  doing.  In  any 
event  the  advantages  to  us  would  have  been 
slight  and  rare ;  the  irritation  of  other  govern 
ments  and  of  their  citizens,  whose  private  cor 
respondence  might  have  been  tampered  with, 
would  have  been  constant  and  extreme,  and 
might  have  led  to  most  serious  consequences. 

The  permission  granted,  at  the  request  of  their 
government,  to  the  French,  who  wished  to  do  so, 
to  leave  New  Orleans  by  passing  through  the 
blockade  is  another  instance  of  the  same  policy. 
The  abuse  of  a  similar  privilege  by  a  British 
consul  and  the  commander  of  an  English  man- 
of-war,  which  had  been  authorized  for  a  special 
purpose  to  enter  a  blockaded  port,  shows  the 
extent  to  which  their  sympathy  with  the  South 
could  carry  two  British  public  servants.  They 
permitted  the  Confederate  government  to  ship 
and  send  to  England  by  this  vessel  gold  for  the 
payment  of  its  obligations  there,  that  it  might 
in  this  way  escape  any  risk  of  capture.  When 
Seward  remonstrated,  the  consul  was  dismissed 
from  the  service;  but  the  mischief  had  been 
already  done. 

The  blockade  gave  rise  to  many  complaints, 
most  of  them  depending  on  questions  of  fact,  as 
to  which  it  was  not  always  easy  to  ascertain  the 


DIPLOMATIC   QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      371 

truth.  Though  the  investigation  of  these  cases 
occupied  a  great  deal  of  time,  they  hardly  fur 
nished  any  cause  for  serious  anxiety;  but  our 
attempt  in  the  autumn  of  1861  to  obstruct  some 
of  the  channels  of  Charleston  Harbor  by  sinking 
old  hulks  loaded  with  stones  —  the  stone  block 
ade,  as  it  was  called  —  seemed  at  one  moment 
to  threaten  difficulties  of  a  graver  character. 
Similar  modes  of  closing  the  entrance  to  a  har 
bor,  by  quasi-permanent  obstructions,  were  not 
wholly  unknown.  The  British  in  the  war  of  the 
Revolution  had  done  something  of  the  sort  at 
Savannah  ;  the  Confederates  during  their  four- 
years  struggle  placed  such  obstructions  in  many 
harbors.  But  on  learning  of  our  stone  block 
ade  Earl  Russell's  temper  seems  to  have  got 
the  better  of  his  courtesy.  He  instructed  Lord 
Lyons  to  remonstrate  with  Mr.  Seward  against 
this  as  a  "cruel  plan,  which  could  only  be 
adopted  as  a  measure  of  revenge  and  of  irre 
mediable  injury  against  an  enemy  ;  "  and  to  say 
further  that  "  even  as  a  scheme  of  bitterest  and 
sanguinary  war,  such  a  measure  would  not  be 
justifiable  ;  that  it  would  be  a  plot  against  the 
commerce  of  all  maritime  nations  and  against 
the  free  intercourse  of  the  Southern  states  of 
America  with  the  civilized  world."  How  far 
Lord  Lyons  in  his  interview  with  Mr.  Seward 
softened  the  offensive  phraseology  of  this  letter 


UNIVERSITY 


372  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

cannot  be  known.  Mr.  Seward's  position  in  the 
matter,  according  to  Lord  Lyons's  report  to  his 
government,  is  exactly  what  he  himself  stated  it 
to  be  in  a  despatch  of  February  17,  1861,  to 
Mr.  Adams,  in  which  he  said :  "I  am  not  pre 
pared  to  recognize  the  right  of  other  nations  to 
object  to  the  manner  of  placing  artificial  ob 
structions  in  the  channels  of  rivers  leading  to 
ports  which  have  been  seized  by  insurgents  in 
their  attempts  to  overthrow  this  government.  I 
am  nevertheless  desirous  that  the  exaggerations 
on  that  subject  which  have  been  indulged  abroad 
may  be  corrected."  He  adds  that  he  has  applied 
to  the  navy  department  for  information,  and 
has  learned  that  there  are  two  ship  channels 
in  which  no  artificial  obstructions  have  been  or 
are  to  be  placed,  and  which  are  guarded  only  by 
the  blockading  squadron.  Nothing  further  was 
heard  from  Great  Britain  on  the  subject.  The 
sunken  hulks  were  gradually  washed  away  by 
storms,  and  the  necessity  for  the  discussion  dis 
appeared  with  the  obstructions. 

The  personal  questions  as  to  foreigners  were 
not  confined  to  matters  having  their  origin  in 
our  blockade.  There  were  numerous  com 
plaints  of  unjust  imprisonment  or  of  hard 
usage  as  to  their  persons  or  property  by  resi 
dent  foreigners  of  various  nationalities.  Care 
and  patience  were  requisite  for  the  examination 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      373 

of  these,  and  tact  and  good  sense  for  deciding 
them ;  but  they  were  all  disposed  of  without 
hard  feeling,  except  those  arising  out  of  Gen 
eral  Butler's  government  at  New  Orleans.  The 
foreign  population  there,  a  majority  of  which 
was  French,  had  strong  secession  sympathies, 
and  was  not  disposed  to  submit  quietly  to  But 
ler's  arbitrary  proceedings.  Complaints  from 
the  foreign  ministers  came  thick  and  fast ;  some 
were  of  a  very  serious  nature,  involving  claims 
for  large  amounts  of  property  confiscated,  of 
money  seized,  without  apparent  justification, 
together  with  demands  for  indemnity  for  per 
sonal  insults  and  injuries.  They  engrossed  half 
Seward's  time,  and  were  seriously  endangering 
our  friendly  relations  with  the  great  powers 
of  Europe,  until,  "  to  relieve  their  uneasiness," 
Banks  was  sent  to  succeed  Butler.  Butler's  pro 
ceedings  were  gratifying  to  the  vindictive  feel 
ings  of  the  North  towards  the  secessionists,  and 
at  the  time  were  much  approved.  They  may 
have  been  necessary  for  the  maintenance  of  pub 
lic  order  ;  if  they  were  not  so,  it  was  certainly 
injudicious  to  run  such  risks  of  a  rupture  with 
France,  which  would  probably  have  involved 
one  with  England  also.  It  is  not  impossible 
that  the  action  of  the  state  department  on  some 
of  these  complaints  of  the  foreigners  at  New 
Orleans  may  have  been  the  alleged  "  interfer- 


374  WILL  I  A. V  HENRY   SEWARD. 

ence  with  our  generals,"  which  was  urged  as  one 
of  the  reasons  for  asking  Seward's  removal. 

There  is  a  wide  difference  between  a  procla 
mation  of  neutrality  in  the  case  of  a  war  between 
two  states  already  recognized  as  belonging  to 
the  family  of  nations,  and  a  similar  proclama 
tion  in  a  case  where  bands  of  insurgents,  or 
provinces  in  revolt,  are  seeking  to  wrest  their 
independence  from  their  government.  In  the 
former  case  the  proclamation  makes  no  change 
in  the  existing  status,  it  is  a  mere  cautionary 
notice  of  undisputed  facts,  which  are  thus  called 
to  the  attention  of  the  subjects  of  the  govern 
ment  issuing  it,  to  remind  them  of  their  rights 
and  duties.  In  the  latter  it  alters  the  previous 
conditions,  and,  so  far  as  the  citizens  of  the 
country  issuing  it  are  concerned,  actually  creates 
what  it  only  professes  to  recognize,  either  calling 
into  being  as  a  full-grown  nation  (if  it  acknow 
ledges  their  independence),  a  body  of  people  who 
had  previously  no  political  existence  whatever, 
or  turning  a  rebellion  into  a  war,  if  it  only  calls 
them  belligerents.  It  is  really  not  a  declaration 
of  neutrality,  but  a  mild  form  of  intervention  on 
behalf  of  an  incipient  revolution,  and  when  made 
jointly  by  several  powerful  nations  at  the  same 
time,  is  a  pretty  efficacious  one ;  it  is  also  dis 
tinctly  an  act  injurious  to  the  government  en 
deavoring  to  put  down  its  rebellious  citizens. 


DIPLOMATIC   QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      375 

The  only  way  for  any  foreign  government  to 
maintain  a  real  neutrality  in  such  a  struggle  is 
to  leave  the  rebels  alone  to  gain  their  independ 
ence  if  they  can,  and  the  government  undis 
turbed  to  crush  the  insurrection  if  it  is  able. 
It  was  not  this  absolute  neutrality  which  Eng 
land  and  France  assumed  to  maintain  towards  us 
during  the  rebellion.  Their  proclamations  at 
the  outset  gave  countenance  to  the  South,  and 
the  hope  of  something  more. 

Our  complaints  of  these  proclamations  at 
the  time  they  were  issued  have  already  been 
spoken  of.  It  soon  appeared,  that,  so  far  as  Eng 
land  was  concerned,  the  immediate  and  princi 
pal  effect  of  her  course  was  to  stimulate  all  her 
industries  and  manufactures,  and  to  encourage 
her  people  to  do  their  utmost  to  supply  the  needs 
of  our  states  in  rebellion,  whose  only  resources 
were  agricultural,  whose  main  dependence  for 
everything  essential  to  carrying  on  their  strug 
gle  was  the  workshops  and  factories  of  Great 
Britain,  and  who,  without  the  supplies  received 
in  this  way,  would  have  been  quickly  subdued. 
The  perception  of  these  facts  quickened  and 
intensified  our  ifense  of  the  wrong  done  us  by 
England  at  the  outset ;  it  gave  rise  to  a  general 
conviction  that  the  British  government  was  not 
reluctant  to  gain  advantages  for  its  own  citizens 
at  our  expense,  and  was  the  source  of  a  wide- 


376  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEW  AMD. 

spread  belief  that  to  secure  this  result  had  been 
the  purpose  of  its  original  action. 

We  also  complained  that  England  persistently 
violated  in  various  ways  the  duties  and  obliga 
tions  of  the  neutrality  she  had  declared.  We 
charged  her  with  doing  so  by  permitting  the 
Confederates  to  use,  at  first  Nassau  in  the  Brit 
ish  Bahamas,  and  later  Bermuda,  as  military 
bases,  and  depots  for  their  arms,  ammunition, 
stores  and  equipments.  Against  this  use  of  these 
ports  Seward  protested  strenuously ;  but  his  re 
monstrances  produced  no  effect.  If  England 
had  made  no  proclamation  of  neutrality,  such 
assistance  to  unrecognized  rebels  would  not  have 
been  tolerated  ;  but  under  the  circumstances  it 
is  doubtful  if  it  was  a  technical  breach  of  neu 
trality,  though  if  it  had  clearly  been  so,  it  could 
not  have  done  us  more  grievous  harm. 

Our  complaints  against  England's  violations 
of  neutrality,  however,  went  far  beyond  this. 
We  charged  her  with  gross  breaches  of  it  in 
permitting  rebel  cruisers,  intended  to  prey  upon 
our  commerce,  to  be  built  in  her  ship-yards, 
equipped  and  armed  from  her  workshops,  provis 
ioned  and  manned  by  her  sailors  and  subjects. 
Early  in  1862,  complaint  was  made  to  the  Brit 
ish  government  as  to  the  construction  of  a  ves 
sel  for  this  purpose.  She  was  finished,  regis 
tered  as  an  English  ship  and  cleared  as  such  for 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS   OF   THE    WAR,      377 

Palermo.  She  never  went  there,  but  appeared 
at  Bermuda,  eventually  ran  the  blockade  into 
Mobile,  where  she  was  armed,  successfully  es 
caped  from  there,  and  cruised  as  the  Florida. 
She  made  many  prizes  in  the  Atlantic,  and  hav 
ing  burnt  one  of  our  ships  off  the  Irish  coast, 
went  in  to  Brest  to  land  its  crew  and  make 
some  repairs,  and,  in  spite  of  our  remonstrances, 
was  there  allowed  to  ship  a  fresh  crew  for  her 
self  and  start  again.  She  ended  her  career  in 
October,  1864,  at  Bahia.  She  was  cut  out  from 
under  the  guns  of  a  Brazilian  battery  and  the 
broadside  of  a  guard-ship,  by  the  United  States 
steamer  Wachusett,  and  brought  into  Hampton 
Roads,  where  she  fortunately  solved  a  diplo 
matic  difficulty  by  springing  a  leak  and  sinking. 
Brazil  accepted  our  apology  for  the  violation  of 
her  sovereignty  in  the  attack  on  the  rebel  ship, 
and  the  removal  of  our  consul  who  had  advised 
it,  with  the  sending  of  the  commander  of  the 
Wachusett  before  a  court-martial,  as  sufficient 
amends  for  the  offense. 

Towards  the  end  of  June  in  the  same  year 
(1862),  Mr.  Adams  informed  Lord  Russell  that 
a  new  and  more  powerful  steamer  was  nearly 
ready  to  leave  Liverpool  on  the  same  errand 
as  the  Florida.  She  did  not  in  fact  sail  until 
the  29th  of  July,  but  the  British  government 
was  not  able  during  this  whole  month  to  satisfy 


378  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

itself,  until  it  was  too  late,  that  there  was  any  evi 
dence  which  would  justify  her  detention.  This 
vessel  was  the  Alabama.  She  slipped  out  of 
port  and  waited  off  the  coast  until  she  had  re 
ceived  a  crew  of  forty  men  sent  her  in  a  tug 
from  Liverpool ;  off  the  Azores  she  was  met 
by  two  vessels,  which  had  sailed  directly  from 
England,  bringing  all  her  armament,  clothing 
for  her  crew,  a  supply  of  coal,  and  her  captain 
and  officers.  As  British  ships  are  British  terri 
tory,  it  seems  that  in  this  case  the  vessel  was 
built,  equipped,  armed  and  manned  under  the 
British  flag  and  protection ;  and  that  the  breach 
of  neutrality  and  the  violation  of  the  spirit,  if 
not  of  the  letter,  of  the  municipal  law  of  Eng 
land  were  complete  in  every  particular  before 
she  hoisted  the  Confederate  colors.  It  has  been 
admitted  by  a  British  jurist  that,  "  had  the  whole 
series  of  transactions  which  finally  placed  her  on 
the  ocean  armed,  manned,  provisioned  and  com 
missioned  for  war,  been  within  the  knowledge  of 
the  British  government,  and  within  its  power  of 
control,  she  would  never  have  left  the  Mersey ;  " 
and,  if  it  be  conceded  that  the  display  of  the 
Confederate  flag  and  the  exhibition  of  a  Confed 
erate  commission,  under  the  circumstances  stated, 
so  changed  her  character  that  she  could  no  longer 
be  proceeded  against  and  condemned  in  any 
British  port,  it  may  fairly  be  claimed  that  a  due 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      379 

regard  to  the  neutrality  they  professed,  to  the 
dignity  of  the  crown  and  to  the  spirit  of  their 
laws  would  have  more  than  justified  the  Brit 
ish  ministry  in  refusing  to  this  vessel,  English 
in  everything  but  the  name,  an  asylum  in-  any 
harbor  under  their  jurisdiction.  Instead  of  this 
she  was  received  at  every  British  port  she  chose 
to  visit,  and  met  there  a  liberal  hospitality  quite 
different  from  the  bare  toleration  which  was 
grudgingly  given  to  our  men-of-war.  She  began 
her  predatory  cruising  in  August,  1862,  and  fin 
ished  it  twenty-two  months  later  in  June,  1864i 
when  she  was  sunk  off  Cherbourg  by  the  United 
States  steamer  Kearsarge  after  an  hour's  action. 
During  her  cruises  she  captured  and  destroyed 
about  sixty  American  vessels,  most  of  which 
were  merchantmen  employed  in  foreign  voyages. 
Applications  to  the  ministry  having  proved 
ineffectual  to  prevent  the  sailing  of  the  rebel 
cruisers,  Seward  wrote  to  Mr.  Adams  :  "  As  one 
more  resource,  it  is  deemed  advisable  that  an 
effort  be  made  to  secure  the  enforcement  of  the 
enlistment  laws  through  the  action  of  the  courts  " 
(April  2,  1863).  In  pursuance  of  these  instruc 
tions  Mr.  Adams  furnished  the  British  govern 
ment  with  such  evidence  that  proceedings  were 
begun  against  the  owners  of  the  steamer  Alex 
andra.  At  the  trial  there  was  no  dispute  about 
the  facts.  The  vessel  was  built  under  a  contract 


380  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

with  the  agent  of  the  Confederate  government 
and  was  intended  for  use  as  a  man-of-war.  She 
was  not  finished  at  the  time  the  proceedings  were 
begun ;  and  the  jury  were  instructed  that  to  bring 
the  case  within  the  provisions  of  the  foreign  en 
listment  act  her  equipment  must  have  been  so 
far  completed  in  British  territory  that  she  was 
capable  of  hostile  operations,  or  that  if  it  were 
not  already  so  complete,  it  must  be  proved  that 
it  was  intended  it  should  be  completed  in  British 
territory.  They  were  also  told  that,  although 
the  vessel  had  been  built  and  was  to  be  used 
as  a  cruiser,  if  it  was  intended  to  put  the  arms 
on  board  at  a  place  beyond  British  jurisdiction 
there  would  be  no  violation  of  the  foreign  en 
listment  act.  Upon  these  instructions  the  jury 
found  for  the  defendants.  The  subsequent  ac 
tion  of  the  judge  who  presided  at  the  trial  was 
such  as,  under  the  English  forms  of  procedure, 
precluded  any  final,  authoritative  decision  as  to 
the  construction  of  the  statute.  The  case  left 
the  Confederates  at  liberty  to  violate  without 
substantial  inconvenience  the  spirit  of  interna 
tional  law,  and  to  evade  both  the  letter  and 
spirit  of  the  municipal  statutes. 

The  gravity  of  the  situation  was  at  once  ap 
preciated  here,  and  Seward  wrote  to  Mr.  Adams 
that,  if  the  law  of  this  case  was  to  regulate 
the  action  of  her  Majesty's  government,  the 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      381 

United  States  would  be  without  any  guarantee 
against  the  unlimited  employment  of  capital  by 
British  subjects  in  building  and  sending  forth 
ships  of  war  from  British  ports  to  make  war 
against  the  United  States,  and  that  this  would 
be,  in  effect,  "  a  war  waged  against  this  country 
by  a  portion  at  least  of  the  British  nation,  and 
tolerated,  though  not  declared,  by  the  British 
government."^/ He  suggested  to  the  English  min 
istry,  whether  Parliament  would  "  not  consider 
it  just  and  expedient  to  amend  the  existing  stat 
ute  in  such  a  way  as  to  effect  what  the  two  gov 
ernments  actually  believed  it  ought  to  accom 
plish  ;  "  and  he  added,  that  if  her  Majesty's  gov 
ernment  should  desire  such  a  proceeding,  the 
President  would  not  hesitate  to  apply  to  Con 
gress  for  an  equivalent  amendment  of  the  laws 
of  the  United  States.  Mr.  Adams  made  the 
suggestion,  and  Earl  Russell  expressed  his  will 
ingness  to  propose  amendments,  on  condition 
that  they  should  also  be  adopted  in  the  Ameri 
can  act;  but  when  Mr.  Adams  informed  him 
later  of  the  assent  of  our  government  to  this 
proposal,  he  was  told  that  her  Majesty's  gov 
ernment  had  reconsidered  the  matter  and  de 
clined  to  suggest  any  amendments.  This  closed 
the  negotiations ;  the  act  remained  unchanged 
till  the  end  of  the  rebellion. 

The   English   government,  however,   became 


382  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

more  ready  to  exert  themselves  to  prevent  tho 
construction  and  sailing  of  Confederate  cruis 
ers.  Two  rams  that  were  building  in  Liverpool, 
under  the  supervision  of  the  officer  in  charge 
of  the  Confederate  naval  bureau  of  construction 
there,  were  seized  and  detained,  and  were  finally 
bought  by  the  Crown.  The  only  vessel  of  im 
portance  which  subsequently  got  away  was  the 
Shenandoah,  whose  depredations  were  continued 
long  after  the  Southern  armies  had  surrendered 
and  peace  had  been  restored.  In  October, 
1864,  when  Sherman  had  already  taken  Atlanta, 
Farragut  had  captured  Mobile,  and  the  fall  of 
the  Confederacy  was  evidently  a  mere  question 
of  months,  she  left  London  as  the  Sea  King. 
Off  a  little  island  near  Madeira  she  met  by  ap 
pointment  another  steamer  direct  from  Liver 
pool,  from  which  she  received  her  arms,  ammuni 
tion  and  stores ;  she  raised  the  Confederate  flag 
and  started  on  her  cruise  as  the  Shenandoah. 
In  January,  1865,  she  put  in  at  Melbourne, 
filled  up  her  crew,  and  proceeded  to  the  Arctic 
Ocean,  where  she  destroyed  the  American  whal 
ing  fleet,  continuing  her  depredations  until  she 
learned  in  August  from  an  English  ship  that 
the  Confederacy  had  ceased  to  exist.  Returning 
to  Liverpool,  she  was  taken  possession  of  by  the 
Crown,  and  was  subsequently  delivered  to  the 
government  of  the  United  States. 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      383 

All  these  vessels,  not  only  those  that  have 
been  mentioned,  but  others  that  have  not  been 
named,  though  called  Confederate  cruisers,  were 
built  to  overhaul,  plunder,  and  destroy  unarmed 
merchantmen,  but,  as  the  captain  of  one  of  them 
frankly  admitted,  not  to  fight,  "  unless  in  a 
very  urgent  case."  Their  operations  occasioned 
an  enormous  amount  of  diplomatic  correspond 
ence  and  negotiation,  which  lasted  after  Seward 
ceased  to  be  secretary  of  state.  So  long  as  Mr. 
Adams  remained  in  England  it  was  conducted 
by  him,  upon  general  lines  laid  down  by  Sew 
ard,  but  with  the  largest  discretion  given  to  Mr. 
Adams.  For  a  time  each  new  vessel  destroyed 
was  made  the  subject  of  a  fresh  complaint, 
until  this  constant  repetition  of  similar  demands 
drew  from  Lord  Russell  the  impatient  declara 
tion,  "  that  he  wished  to  say  once  for  all,  that 
her  Majesty's  government  disclaimed  any  re 
sponsibility  for  these  losses,  and  hoped  they  had 
made  their  position  perfectly  clear."  Neverthe 
less  a  subsequent  ministry  expressed  her  Ma 
jesty's  regret  for  the  escape  of  these  vessels  from 
British  ports  and  for  the  depredations  commit 
ted  by  them,  agreed  to  submit  to  arbitration  the 
question  of  Great  Britain's  liability  for  these, 
and  consented  that  the  arbitrators  should  ac 
cept  as  the  law  which  should  govern  their  deci 
sion,  the  rules,  —  That  a  neutral  power  is  bound 


384  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

to  use  due  diligence  to  prevent  the  fitting  out, 
arming  or  equipping  within  its  jurisdiction  of 
any  vessel  which  it  has  reasonable  grounds  to 
believe  is   intended  to  cruise  or  carry  on   war 
against  any  power  with  which  it  is  at  peace : 
That  it  is  bound  in  the  same  way  to  prevent  the 
departure  from  its  jurisdiction  of  any  such  ves 
sel  which  has  been  either  wholly  or  partly  fitted 
there  for  such  warlike  use :     That  it  cannot  per 
mit  a  belligerent  to  use  its  ports  or  waters  as  a 
base  of  naval  operations  against  his  enemy,  or 
for  the  purpose  of  renewing  or  increasing  his 
arms  or  other  military  supplies,  or  of  enlisting 
men ;  and  lastly,  that  it  must  exercise  due  dili 
gence  as  to  all   persons   and   places  within  its 
jurisdiction   to   prevent   the  violation    of   these 
obligations.      By  the    award  of  the  arbitrators 
to  whom  was   submitted  the  question  of  Great 
Britain's  liability  under  these  rules  for  the  acts 
of  the  Confederate  cruisers,  she  was  compelled 
to   pay  fifteen  million    five    hundred   thousand 
dollars  (115,500,000)  for  property  actually  de 
stroyed  by  them.     This  sum  was  intended  as  a 
compensation  to  American  shipowners  and  citi 
zens  for  the  loss  of  their  property ;  but  for  the 
heaviest  loss  to  the  country,  and  one  from  which 
it  has  never  recovered,  that  of  its  share  in  the 
carrying  trade  of  the   world,  no  compensation 
was    made.      It  was  this  trade   to  which   Mr. 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      385 

Adams  referred  when  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Seward 
early  in  the  war,  that  "  the  English  people 
would  be  gratified  at  anything  which  would  in 
flict  an  injury  on  American  commerce,  of  which 
they  are  very  jealous." 

The  building  and  depredations  of  the  Ala 
bama  and  her  sister  ships  were  not,  however, 
the  only  matters  of  diplomatic  correspondence 
and  complaint  as  to  these  cruisers.  Their  re 
ception  in  foreign  ports,  the  right  of  coaling,  and 
other  privileges  accorded  them  there,  and  the 
courtesies  alleged  to  have  been  shown  to  their 
officers  but  refused  to  ours  were  the  subject  of 
constant  remonstrances  from  the  state  depart 
ment  ;  and  though  some  of  these  matters  might 
seem  trifling,  and  the  complaints  unavailing, 
they  served  to  make  the  colonial  governors  of 
the  various  European  powers  more  cautious 
about  overstepping  the  bounds  of  neutrality,  and 
to  lessen  the  instances  in  which  they  actually 
did  so.  On  the  other  hand,  it  was  charged  that 
our  naval  officers  pursued  blockade  runners  into 
neutral  waters,  lay  in  wait  for  Confederate 
cruisers  in  foreign  harbors,  and  often  failed  to 
observe  the  courtesies  expected  from  ships  of  war 
in  friendly  ports ;  and  every  such  complaint  re 
quired  to  be  investigated,  and  explained  or  an 
swered,  or  an  apology  made  whenever  there  was 
shown  to  be  just  ground  of  offense. 


386  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

There  were  other  matters  as  to  which  we  con 
sidered  that  Great  Britain  gave  us  good  cause 
of  complaint. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  war,  in  October, 
1864,  a  few  men,  coming  as  ordinary  travelers 
from  Canada  to  St.  Albans,  Vermont,  were  met 
there  by  others  arriving  from  Chicago ;  the  two 
bands,  having  joined  forces,  attempted  unsuc 
cessfully  to  set  the  town  on  fire ;  they  robbed 
the  banks  of  their  specie  and  then  crossed  the 
frontier  into  Canada,  where  several  of  them  were 
arrested.  Seward  endeavored  in  vain  to  obtain 
their  extradition  as  criminals.  British  writers 
have  admitted  that,  had  they  been  caught  in 
Vermont,  they  would  have  had  no  claim  to  be 
treated  as  military  prisoners  ;  but  the  Canadian 
court  refused  to  surrender  them,  on  the  ground 
that  what  they  had  done  was  not  a  crime  but  an 
act  of  war.  Somewhat  similar  occurrences  took 
place  on  board  steamers  on  the  lakes  or  on  coast 
wise  voyages  on  the  Atlantic.  When  parties 
of  apparently  innocent  passengers  threw  off  their 
disguise  and  seized  and  plundered  the  steamers 
on  which  they  had  embarked,  their  surrender 
was  refused  on  similar  grounds,  the  court  say 
ing  :  Either  this  is  an  act  of  piracy  on  the  high 
seas,  in  which  case  the  men  can  be  tried  here ; 
or  of  war,  in  which  case  they  cannot  be  tried 
anywhere. 


DIPLOMATIC   QUESTIONS   OF   THE    WAR.      387 

It  is  certainly  not  for  the  interests  of  civili 
zation  that  acts  of  this  character,  done  by  bands 
of  desperadoes  for  their  private  gain  and  without 
authority,  should  be  treated  as  acts  of  war  by  a 
neutral.  It  is  doubtful  whether  any  one  con 
nected  with  any  of  these  expeditions  held  any 
regular  commission  from  the  Confederate  author 
ities  ;  it  is  quite  certain  that  no  one  of  the  men 
was  at  the  time  a  soldier  in  the  Confederate 
service,  and  there  was  no  evidence  that  any  of 
the  expeditions  were  in  pursuance  of  the  orders 
of  the  Confederate  government  or  of  any  of  its 
agents.  They  were  the  work  of  marauders. 
The  Canadian  government  was  so  ashamed  of 
the  conduct  of  its  judiciary  that  it  refunded  the 
gold  value  of  the  paper  money  stolen  at  St. 
Albans,  which  by  order  of  court  had  been  given 
back  to  the  thieves,  from  whose  possession  it  had 
been  taken  by  the  police. 

Aside  from  the  diplomatic  difficulties  directly 
connected  with  the  rebellion,  the  condition  of 
affairs  in  Mexico  was  a  source  of  great  anxiety 
during  Lincoln's  administration.  We  were  not 
only  uneasy  as  to  the  temporary  effect  which 
the  troubles  there  might  have  upon  our  foreign 
relations,  but  we  were  also  apprehensive  lest  they 
should  have  a  serious  influence  upon  the  future 
of  our  country. 

Mexico  in  1861  was  indebted  to  citizens  of 


388  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

France,  England,  and  Spain,  who  complained 
that  they  could  not  obtain  payment  of  the  money 
due  them.  The  governments  of  these  three 
countries,  realizing  that  our  domestic  difficulties 
were  their  opportunity,  made  an  alliance  in  the 
autumn  of  that  year,  the  purpose  of  which  was, 
not  merely  to  enforce  the  payment  of  these  debts, 
but  also  to  secure  a  better  protection  for  for 
eigners  resident  in  Mexico.  A  month  after  the 
treaty  was  executed  we  were  invited  to  join  it. 
Seward  declined  the  invitation.  He  suggested 
that  we  might  guarantee  the  Mexican  debt,  and 
that  in  this  way  the  necessity  for  foreign  inter 
vention  would  be  avoided.  This  suggestion  was 
not  accepted ;  it  was  said  that  it  would  leave 
untouched  one  of  the  objects  of  the  alliance, 
security  for  the  future  good  treatment  of  foreign 
ers  living  in  Mexico.  The  original  scheme  of 
the  three  powers  evidently  contemplated  a  tem 
porary  and  limited  occupation  of  the  territory,  if 
nothing  more.  In  declining  to  become  a  party 
to  the  treaty,  Seward  stated  our  strong  interest 
that  no  foreign  power  should  acquire  territory 
in  Mexico,  or  gain  any  peculiar  advantage  there, 
or  exercise  any  influence  to  interfere  with  the 
free  choice  by  the  Mexicans  of  their  own  form 
of  government. 

It  soon  became  evident  that  Louis  Napoleon 
had  aims  quite  different  from  those  of  the  other 


DIPLOMATIC   QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      389 

powers,  and  early  in  April,  1862,  the  Spanish  and 
English  commissioners,  finding  that  the  French 
were  giving  military  aid  to  the  monarchical  party, 
withdrew  from  cooperation  with  them,  and  the 
alliance  was  dissolved.  Mexico  at  this  time 
was  divided  between  the  Church  party,  which 
was  monarchist  and  conservative,  and  the  liberal 
party,  which  was  republican.  The  actual  govern 
ment  was  republican  and  liberal,  but  it  was  weak 
and  unstable.  Napoleon's  plan  was  to  use  his 
power  and  influence  in  favor  of  the  monarchists, 
and  to  obtain,  at  an  election  to  be  held  under 
the  auspices  and  the  control  of  the  French 
troops,  a  plebiscite  creating  a  monarchy  and 
calling  a  foreign  prince  to  the  throne.  He  knew 
that  it  was  the  settled  policy  of  this  country  not 
to  permit  the  establishment  by  a  European  power 
of  any  monarchy  in  America,  and  that,  if  our 
condition  permitted  it,  we  should  interfere,  by 
force  if  need  be,  to  prevent  it.  But  our  hands 
were  tied,  and  he  took  advantage  of  our  necessi 
ties  to  attempt  to  carry  out  his  project.  Before 
the  departure  of  the  first  expedition  for  Mexico, 
rumors  that  this  was  the  Emperor's  scheme  were 
rife  in  Europe,  but  the  French  ministers  in  con 
versations,  apparently  frank,  with  our  represen 
tatives,  and  in  their  diplomatic  correspondence, 
not  only  at  that  time  but  during  the  whole 
French  occupation  of  Mexico,  persistently  denied 


390  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

that  there  was  any  foundation  for-  these  reports, 
or  that  the  Emperor  had  any  purpose  of  forcing 
a  government  upon  that  country.  Though  it 
was  difficult  to  reconcile  these  statements  with 
the  reports  of  the  English  and  Spanish  commis 
sioners,  Seward  in  his  correspondence  accepted 
them  as  true,  and  instructed  our  minister  to  say 
that  we  relied  on  them  as  such ;  and  that  while 
we  recognized  the  right  of  France  to  make  war 
against  Mexico,  and  to  determine  for  herself  the 
cause,  we  had  "  a  right  and  interest  to  insist  that 
she  should  not  improve  the  war  to  raise  up  in 
Mexico  an  anti-republican  or  an  anti- American 
government,  or  to  maintain  such  a  government 
there." 

An  assembly  of  notables,  convened  July  10, 
1863,  by  direction  of  the  French  general,  voted 
to  establish  an  imperial  government  and  elected 
the  Arch-Duke  Maximilian  of  Austria  to  the 
throne.  In  a  despatch  of  September  26,  1863, 
Seward  stated  with  great  distinctness  the  views 
of  our  government  upon  this  matter.  He  said 
that  the  United  States  had  neither  a  right  nor  a 
disposition  to  intervene  by  force  in  the  internal 
affairs  of  Mexico,  either  to  maintain  a  republic 
or  to  overthrow  an  imperial  government,  if  Mex 
ico  chose  to  establish  the  one  or  the  other;  but 
that  our  government  knew  that  the  inherent 
normal  opinion  of  Mexico  favored  a  republican 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.      391 

and  domestic  government  in  preference  to  any 
monarchy  imposed  from  abroad,  and  that  if 
France  should  determine  to  adopt  in  Mexico  a 
policy  adverse  to  these  views,  it  would  probably 
scatter  seeds  which  might  ultimately  "  ripen  into 
collision  between  France  and  the  United  States 
and  other  American  republics."  It  was  intimated 
to  Seward  that  the  early  acknowledgment  of 
Maximilian's  government  by  this  country  would 
tend  to  shorten,  or  perhaps  to  end,  the  French 
occupation  of  Mexico.  To  this  intimation  he 
replied  that  the  French  government  had  been  al 
ready  informed  that  in  the  opinion  of  the  United 
States  the  permanent  establishment  of  a  foreign 
and  monarchical  government  in  Mexico  would 
be  found  neither  easy  nor  desirable;  that  this 
opinion  remained  unchanged ;  and  that,  so  long 
as  the  United  States  continued  to  regard  Mexico 
as  the  theatre  of  a  war,  which  had  not  yet  ended 
in  the  subversion  of  the  existing  republican  gov 
ernment  with  which  this  country  remained  in  re 
lations  of  peace  and  friendship,  we  were  not  at 
liberty  to  consider  the  question  of  recognizing  a 
government  which,  in  the  further  chances  of  war, 
might  come  into  its  place. 

In  all  his  diplomatic  correspondence  since  the 
recognition  of  the  Confederates  as  belligerents 
by  Great  Britain,  Seward  had  been  hampered 
by  a  sense  of  the  possibility  of  a  combination 


392  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

between  one  or  more  of  the  great  maritime 
powers  with  the  insurgents,  and  an  apprehen 
sion  of  the  probable  effect  of  such  a  combina 
tion  upon  our  contest  for  the  preservation  of  the 
Union ;  and  his  efforts  were  directed  to  preserv 
ing  peace  with  all  other  nations  without  impair 
ing  the  dignity  of  his  own  country.  He  had 
stated  with  entire  frankness,  and  with  unmistak 
able  distinctness,  though  in  courteous  language, 
our  position  as  to  the  French  intervention  in 
Mexico,  yet  had  been  careful  to  avoid  using 
any  expressions  which  could  be  construed  into  a 
threat,  or  give  France  an  opportunity  for  break 
ing  with  us.  The  members  of  the  legislative 
department  of  the  government  were  not  so  wise. 
Resolutions  upon  this  subject  were  introduced 
into  both  the  House  and  Senate  in  the  winter 
of  1864.  In  the  Senate  they  were  laid  on  the 
table  on  the  motion  of  Sumner,  who  said  that 
if  they  meant  anything,  if  they  were  not  mere 
words,  they  meant  war.  The  House,  however, 
voted  that  they  were  unwilling  by  silence  to 
"  leave  the  world  under  the  impression  that  they 
were  indifferent  spectators  of  the  deplorable 
events  transpiring  in  the  republic  of  Mexico, 
and  thought  fit  to  declare  that  it  did  not  accord 
with  the  policy  of  the  United  States  to  acknow 
ledge  any  monarchy  erected  in  America  upon 
the  ruins  of  any  republic,  under  the  auspices  of 
any  European  power." 


DIPLOMATIC    QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.     393 

This  action  naturally  excited  the  French  gov 
ernment,  and  brought  from  it  the  direct  inquiry 
to  our  minister,  "  Do  you  mean  peace  or  war?" 
When  this  question  was  put  to  him  he  had  heard 
nothing  from  home,  and  could  only  answer  that 
the  terms  of  the  resolution  were  opposed  to 
the  instructions  contained  in  his  despatches. 
The  French  government,  however,  considered 
the  resolves  as  a  serious  matter,  and  the  seces 
sionists  in  Paris  were  jubilant  until  some  days 
later  a  despatch  was  received,  in  which  Seward 
said,  that  the  question  of  the  recognition  of  a 
monarchy  in  Mexico  was  a  purely  executive 
one,  the  decision  of  which  constitutionally  be 
longed  "not  to  the  House  of  Representatives, 
or  even  to  Congress,  but  to  the  President  of  f\ 
the  United  States,"  and  that  while  the  President 
received  a  declaration  from  the  House  of  Rep-  } 
resentatives  with  the  respect  to  which  it  was 
entitled,  he  did  not  contemplate  any  departure  f 
from  the  policy  he  had  hitherto  pursued  as  to 
France  and  Mexico,  and  that  the  French  govern 
ment  would  be  seasonably  apprised  of  any  change 
which  he  might  ,at  any  future  time  think  proper 
to  adopt.  Fortunately  this  declaration  calmed 
the  French  government,  and  the  new  war,  which 
Congress  seemed  to  court,  without  considering 
that  in  all  probability  it  might  have  been  fatal 
to  our  success  in  the  struggle  we  had  already 


394  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

on  hand,  was  averted  by  the  good  sense  of  the 
President  and  Seward. 

Maximilian  never  obtained  the  popular  vote 
calling  him  to  the  throne,  upon  which  he  had 
at  first  insisted  as  a  condition  precedent  to  his 
acceptance  of  the  crown.  He  went  to  Mexico 
in  the  summer  of  1864.  Negotiations  were  had 
from  time  to  time  between  this  government  and 
France  to  induce  the  Emperor  to  withdraw  his 
troops.  After  the  collapse  of  the  Confederacy, 
attempts  were  made  to  persuade  the  adminis 
tration  to  force  France  to  withdraw  her  troops 
at  once ;  but  Seward  thought  it  wiser  to  give 
her  the  opportunity  to  act  in  the  matter,  in  ap 
pearance  at  least,  upon  her  own  judgment,  and 
not  under  compulsion.  He  succeeded  in  doing 
this.  The  French  troops  were  gradually  with 
drawn  during  the  year  1867,  without  our  having 
assumed  any  position  which  could  wound  the 
pride  of  our  old  Revolutionary  ally.  When  they 
left,  Maximilian  declined  to  desert  his  Mexican 
supporters.  He  was  captured  by  the  Republican 
army.  Seward  interfered  in  vain  to  procure  his 
release  and  liberty  to  return  to  Europe  ;  the 
soldiers  insisted  on  his  execution,  and  the  Mexi 
can  President  did  not  dare  to  refuse  their  de 
mand. 

If  among  Seward's  despatches  during  the 
course  of  the  war  there  are  some  that  deal  with 


DIPLOMATIC   QUESTIONS    OF   THE    WAR.     395 

generalities,  and  seem  prolix  and  dull,  yet  his 
discussions  of  the  actual  questions  submitted  to 
him  are  open  to  no  such  criticism.  They  are 
vigorous,  simple,  direct  and  to  the  point,  and 
always  manly  and  dignified.  Lord  Russell  said 
no  more  than  the  truth,  when  he  spoke  of  the 
singular  and  varied  ability  exhibited  in  them. 
They  are  a  credit  to  American  diplomacy,  a 
monument  to  Seward's  unwearied  powers  of 
work,  and  to  his  intellectual  capacity  and  re 
sources. 

Tried  by  its  results,  the  success  of  his  diplo 
macy  during  the  four  years  of  Lincoln's  admin 
istration  is  entitled  to  the  highest  praise.  We 
were  engaged  in  a  domestic  struggle  which  was 
taxing  our  resources  to  the  utmost,  and  in  which 
we  had  not  the  cordial  good  will  of  a  single  one 
of  the  great  nations  of  the  world,  unless  it  were 
Russia.  The  opportunities  for  differences  with 
these  countries  were  numerous,  the  dangers  of 
the  interference  or  intervention  of  one  or  more 
of  them,  or  of  the  outbreak  of  a  war  between  us 
and  any  one  of  them,  were  almost  constant. 
Seward  conducted  us  safely  through  all  these 
perils,  with  no  breach  of  the  peace  and  no  sacri 
fice  of  the  honor  or  dignity  of  the  country. 


CHAPTER   XXI. 

SECRETARY   OF   STATE   UNDER   JOHNSON.  — 
RETIREMENT   FROM   PUBLIC   LIFE. 

THE  Union  troops  entered  Richmond  on  the 
3d  of  April,  1865.  Two  days  later  Seward 
was  thrown  from  his  carriage,  and  so  badly  in 
jured  that  his  life  was  despaired  of  for  a  time. 
His  right  shoulder  was  dislocated,  and  his  jaw 
broken  on  both  sides.  Nine  days  afterwards, 
late  at  night,  when  only  his  nurse  and  daughter 
were  with  him,  an  unknown  man  succeeded  in 
entering  the  house,  burst  open  the  door  of  his 
chamber,  rushed  to  his  bedside,  and  with  a  bowie- 
knife  slashed  and  stabbed  him  in  the  face  and 
throat,  till,  alarmed  by  the  wakening  household, 
the  would-be  assassin  hastened  to  escape,  fled 
through  the  open  door,  mounted  his  horse  and 
rode  away.  This  assault  was  one  act  in  the  con 
spiracy  whose  supreme  tragedy  was  the  murder 
of  Lincoln  in  the  theatre. 

Seward  survived;  but  for  more  than  a  year 
he  was  compelled  to  wear  mechanical  appliances 
to  retain  the  broken  jaw  in  its  place.  Before 
he  could  leave  his  bed  he  insisted  on  trying  to 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.     397 

work,  and  scrawled  on  scraps  of  paper  directions 
for  his  letters ;  so  soon  as  he  could  be  moved  he 
was  carried  daily  to  his  chair  in  the  State  De 
partment,  where  he  sat,  the  shrunk,  maimed  and 
disfigured  semblance  of  his  former  self.  The 
injuries  which  he  survived  brought  on  him  the 
great  sorrows  of  his  life.  Mrs.  Seward,  who  had 
been  for  some  time  an  invalid,  hastened  from 
Auburn  to  Washington  on  learning  of  his  acci 
dent.  On  the  night  of  the  assault  she  was 
roused  by  the  screams  of  her  daughter,  and 
rushing  from  her  room  found  her  husband  in 
the  state  we  have  described.  The  shock  was  too 
much  for  her ;  she  survived  it  only  two  months, 
dying  on  the  21st  of  June.  The  tributes  of 
praise  to  her  knew  no  exception.  Seward's 
friends  and  foes  alike  recognized  her  charm  and 
her  worth,  and  knew  that  for  him  the  loss  was 
irreparable.  But  this  was  not  the  only  life  that 
was  sacrificed  to  the  assault  upon  him.  His 
only  daughter,  who,  next  to  her  mother,  was  the 
person  dearest  and  most  important  to  him,  was 
in  his  room,  saw  the  attack,  his  struggles  and 
attempts,  in  spite  of  his  feebleness,  to  shield  her 
from  any  blows,  and  the  scenes  of  that  night 
killed  her.  She  lived  little  more  than  a  year ; 
and  her  death  left  Seward  very  desolate. 

Though    for    some    days    after    his    injuries 
Seward's  life  was  in  great  danger,  yet  thanks  to 


398  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

his  vigorous  constitution,  his  unfailing  courage, 
his  excellent  physical  condition,  and  his  equable 
temperament,  his  recovery  was  rapid,  and  less 
than  four  weeks  after  the  attack  on  him  he  was 
able  to  receive  the  President  and  cabinet  at  his 
house.  In  this  short  time  there  had  been  a 
revolution  in  our  political  world.  The  Southern 
Confederacy  had  ceased  to  exist,  its  government 
had  collapsed,  its  officials  were  dispersed,  its  sol 
diers  had  been  paroled  and  sent  home  by  our 
victorious  generals.  The  questions  of  the  true 
relation  of  all  the  seceding  states  to  the  Union, 
and  of  the  proper  treatment  of  the  states  which 
had  seceded  had  therefore  to  be  dealt  with  at 
once,  —  whilst  their  secession  had  been  more 
gradual,  some  of  them  having  been  the  ring 
leaders  in' rebellion,  and  others  having  followed 
with  more  or  less  reluctance  and  hesitation.  It 
had  been  Mr.  Lincoln's  idea  that  no  uniform 
rule  should  be  established,  to  be  applied  indis 
criminately  to  the  rehabilitation  of  all  these 
states ;  but  that  each  one  should  be  treated  as 
seemed  wisest  with  reference  to  its  own  people 
and  condition,  without  regard  to  the  others,  al 
ways  bearing  in  mind  the  declared  object  of  the 
contest  on  our  part,  —  "  the  maintenance  and 
preservation  of  the  Union,"  -  —  and  troubling  our 
selves  as  little  as  possible  with  theories  as  to  the 
effect  of  their  attempted  secession  upon  the  rela- 


SECRETARY   OF   STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    399 

tions  of  these  states  to  the  Federal  government. 
He  also  believed  that  it  was  for  him,  as  Presi 
dent,  to  determine  when  the  rebellion  had  been 
so  far  crushed  that  military  rule  could  come  to 
an  end,  the  troops  be  withdrawn,  the  ordinary 
machinery  of  civil  government  put  in  motion, 
and  the  state  left  to  itself  ;  each  House  of  Con 
gress  having,  as  to  any  of  the  states  in  rebellion, 
the  same  constitutional  right  that  it  has  as  to 
all  the  states,  to  be  "  the  judge  of  the  elections, 
returns  and  qualifications  of  its  own  members." 
He  had  already  put  in  practice  in  Louisiana  a 
scheme  which  seemed  to  him  satisfactory  for 
that  state,  and  two  representatives  chosen  there 
in  the  autumn  of  1862  had  been  admitted  as 
members  of  Congress  in  February  of  the  follow 
ing  year.  A  similar  experiment  was  tried  in 
Arkansas  about  the  same  time. 

In  his  annual  message  in  December,  1863,  the 
President  made  a  full  statement  of  what  he  had 
done  to  bring  about  the  resumption  of  the  na 
tional  authority  in  the  states  where  it  had  been 
suspended,  and  transmitted  with  the  message  a 
copy  of  an  amnesty  proclamation,  granting  a 
pardon  to  those  persons  concerned  in  the  rebel 
lion,  who  would  take  an  oath  to  support  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States,  the  Union  of 
the  states  thereunder,  and  all  acts  of  Congress 
with  reference  to  slaves  passed  during  the  rebel- 


400  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

lion,  "  so  long  and  so  far  as  not  repealed,  mod 
ified  or  held  void  by  Congress,  or  by  decision 
of  the  Supreme  Court."  Six  classes  of  per 
sons  were  excepted  from  the  promised  pardon. 
Whenever  in  any  of  the  states  in  rebellion  a 
number  of  voters,  not  belonging  to  any  of  the 
excepted  classes,  and  equal  to  ten  per  cent,  of 
those  voting  for  President  in  1860,  should  have 
taken  the  required  oath,  he  was  willing  to  trust 
them  to  form  a  state  government,  and,  if  it  were 
such  a  republican  government  as  the  Constitu 
tion  provides  that  the  United  States  shall  guar 
antee  to  every  state  in  the  Union,  to  recognize 
it  as  the  true  government  of  the  state.  He 
was  careful  to  say  that  he  did  not  intend  this  to 
be  a  Procrustean  bed  to  which  exact  conformity 
was  indispensable,  and  that  he  would  by  no 
means  exclude  the  consideration  and  adoption 
of  other  plans. 

The  message  and  proclamation  were  not  well 
received  by  Congress.  There  was  a  general 
feeling  of  irritation  that  the  President  should 
have  assumed  upon  his  own  responsibility  the 
initiative  and  power  of  decision  in  a  matter, 
which,  it  was  said,  was  either  exclusively  a  sub 
ject  for  legislation,  or  one  about  which  Congress 
should,  at  least,  have  been  consulted.  In  the 
Senate  Sumner  offered  a  resolution  declaring 
that  a  state  pretending  to  secede  from  the  Union, 


SECRETARY   OF   STATE    UNDER   JOHNSON.    401 

and  "battling  against  the  general  government 
to  maintain  that  position,  must  be  regarded  as  a 
rebel  state,  subject  to  military  occupation,  and 
without  representation  .  .  .  until  it  has  been 
re-admitted  by  both  Houses  of  Congress."  The 
Senate  was  not  yet  ready  for  so  strong  a  state 
ment,  and  a  resolve  that  "  the  rebellion  was  not 
so  far  suppressed  in  Arkansas  as  to  entitle  that 
state  to  representation  in  Congress  "  was  substi 
tuted  and  passed.  The  definitive  action,  however, 
in  reply  to  the  President,  was  a  bill,  —  the  first 
reconstruction  act,  —  passed  on  the  last  day  of 
the  session,  July  4,  1864.  This  act  required 
the  President  to  appoint  a  provisional  governor 
for  each  of  the  states  which  had  been  declared  in 
rebellion,  who,  when  military  resistance  ceased, 
should  make  an  enrollment  of  the  white  male 
citizens.  If  a  majority  of  them  should  take  an 
oath  to  support  the  Constitution,  the  governor 
was  to  order  an  election  of  delegates  for  a  con 
stitutional  convention.  This  convention  was  to 
declare  on  behalf  of  the  people  of  the  state  their 
submission  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  and  also  to  insert  in  the  constitution  to 
be  framed  for  the  state,  articles  providing  that 
no  office-holder  under  the  Confederate  govern 
ment,  except  civil  officers  merely  ministerial  and 
military  officers  of  inferior  grades,  should  ever 
vote  for,  or  be,  either  governor  or  a  member  of 


402  WILLIAM   HENRY  SEWARD. 

the  state  legislature;  that  no  rebel  war  debt, 
state  or  Confederate,  should  ever  be  paid,  and 
that  slavery  was  forever  prohibited.  When  a 
constitution  containing  these  provisions  should 
have  been  adopted  by  a  majority  of  the  popular 
vote,  the  governor  was  to  certify  the  fact  to  the 
President,  and  the  President,  after  receiving  the 
assent  of  Congress,  was  to  recognize  the  state 
government  so  established. 

This  act  was  not  signed  by  Mr.  Lincoln,  and 
a  few  days  after  the  adjournment  of  Congress, 
he  made  public  his  reasons  for  this,  which  were, 
that  he  was  not  willing  to  commit  himself  to 
one  inflexible  plan  of  restoration ;  or  to  discour 
age  and  repel  the  loyal  citizens  of  Louisiana  and 
Arkansas,  and  set  aside  their  free  state l  govern 
ments  ;  or  to  declare  Congress  constitutionally 
competent  to  abolish  slavery  in  the  states.  He 
said,  however,  that  if  any  states  chose  to  adopt 
the  plan  proposed  in  the  bill,  he  would  render 
them  all  possible  executive  assistance  and  would 
appoint  military  governors  to  act  according  to 
its  provisions.  Wade  of  the  Senate,  and  Henry 
Winter  Davis  of  the  House,  replied  to  the  Pres 
ident  in  a  paper  personally  vituperative,  and 
reflecting  on  his  motives,  which  the  country 
knew  to  be  above  suspicion.  Lincoln  was  re- 

1  Slavery  had  already  been  abolished  in  both  these  states  by 
constitutional  amendments. 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    403 

elected.  Congress  at  its  next  session  (Febru 
ary  4,  1865)  passed  a  joint  resolve  declaring 
certain  states  not  entitled  to  representation  in 
the  electoral  college.  This  resolve  excluded 
Arkansas  and  Louisiana,  and  was  intended  as  a 
rebuke  to  the  President.  It  was  sent  to  him  for 
his  signature.  He  returned  it,  signed,  but  with 
a  message  stating  that  he  signed  it  "  in  deference 
to  the  views  implied  in  its  passage  and  presen 
tation,"  though  he  thought  Congress  had  com 
plete  power  to  exclude  all  electoral  votes  which 
it  deemed  illegal,  and  that  the  president  could 
not  by  his  veto  obstruct  or  defeat  the  exercise 
of  this  power.  He  disclaimed  all  right  of  inter 
ference,  and  said  that  by  his  signature  he  ex 
pressed  no  opinion  on  the  recital  of  the  pream 
ble,  and  no  judgment  upon  the  subject  of  the 
resolve. 

This  short  statement  shows  the  substance  of 
what  had  been  done  in  the  way  of  reconstruction 
before  Lincoln's  death,  and  makes  sufficiently 
clear  the  radical  difference  already  existing  be 
tween  the  President  and  Congress,  and  the 
measures  adopted  by  Congress  to  assert  and 
maintain  its  right  of  control  in  the  matter  of 
reconstruction.  Lincoln  was  very  desirous  to 
avoid  a  personal  issue,  and  willing  to  make  any 
concessions  which  did  not  involve  a  sacrifice  of 
his  convictions,  or  of  what  he  believed  to  be  the 


404  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

prerogatives  and  duties  of  his  office.  In  his  last 
public  utterance,  only  a  few  days  before  his 
death,  he  reaffirmed  his  faith  in  the  wisdom  and 
justice  of  his  course,  and  his  conviction  that 
any  inflexible  plan  of  reconstruction  would  be  a 
mistake.  He  had  originally  called  for  troops  to 
suppress  a  resistance  to  the  execution  of  the  laws, 
too  powerful  to  be  overcome  by  the  ordinary 
judicial  processes.  There  is  no  question  that  it 
is  for  the  President  alone  to  determine  when  the 
emergency  has  arisen  which  authorizes  him  to 
require  the  aid  of  the  soldiery  for  this  purpose ; 
and  in  the  absence  of  any  express  provision  of 
law,  it  seemed  to  Lincoln  a  legitimate  conclu 
sion,  that  it  was  also  for  him  to  decide  when  the 
exigency  had  ceased  and  the  enforcement  of  the 
laws  could  safely  be  left  to  the  civil  authorities, 
and  that  it  was  his  duty  therefore  to  ascertain, 
by  whatever  means  seemed  to  him  best  adapted 
for  the  purpose,  the  facts  necessary  for  his  de 
cision  upon  this  point. 

All  that  Lincoln  did  as  to  reconstruction  may 
be  explained  and  justified,  as  being  the  means  he 
adopted  to  satisfy  himself  as  to  the  public  opin 
ion  and  temper  of  the  South,  and  to  determine 
whether  the  troops  could  be  withdrawn,  and  the 
execution  of  the  laws  of  the  United  States  safely 
intrusted  to  the  ordinary  civil  government.  To 
secure  this  it  was  necessary  that  the  leading  men 


SECRETARY   OF   STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    405 

of  the  South  should  accept  without  reservation 
all  the  results  of  the  failure  of  their  attempted 
revolution,  should  honestly  endeavor  to  make 
the  best  of  the  situation,  should  be  ready  to  take 
the  hand  that  Lincoln  was  holding  out  to  them, 
and  to  cooperate  heartily  with  him  to  bring  about 
the  harmonious  restoration  of  the  Union.  If 
they  would  not  do  this,  either  they  must  be  dis 
franchised  and  the  work  intrusted  to  less  com 
petent  hands,  or  the  military  rule  must  be  pro 
longed  until  there  should  be  some  satisfactory 
security  that  the  rebel  states  had  not  merely  laid 
down  their  arms,  but  that  they  would  not  try  to 
evade  the  new  conditions  imposed  upon  them  by 
the  emancipation  of  their  slaves  and  the  aboli 
tion  of  slavery.  Possibly,  if  Lincoln  had  lived, 
their  confidence  in  his  candor,  his  integrity,  his 
magnanimity  and  kindliness,  aided  by  his  own 
rare  tact  and  knowledge  of  men,  might  have 
caused  his  plan  to  be  honestly  accepted  by  the 
Southern  leaders.  If  he  had  succeeded  in  this, 
it  is  more  than  probable  that  he  would  have 
had  the  support  of  a  majority  in  the  thirty-ninth 
Congress  (March  4,  1865,  to  March  4,  1867) 
which,  as  we  shall  see,  was  at  first  induced  with 
some  difficulty  to  overrule  Johnson's  vetoes  ;  if 
his  plan  had  not  worked  satisfactorily,  he  would 
have  been  open-minded  enough  to  recognize  its 
failure,  and  wise  enough  to  modify  or  even  to 


406  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

abandon  it,  as  the  case  might  require.  Whether 
he  would  ever  have  assented  to  imposing  upon 
the  South  the  emancipated  slaves  as  voters  is 
more  doubtful.  He  would  not  have  excluded 
any  one  from  the  ballot  on  account  of  his  color ; 
but  he  never  went  farther  than  to  suggest  that 
it  was  worthy  of  consideration  whether  the  fran 
chise  might  not  be  conferred  as  a  special  privi 
lege  on  some  of  the  more  capable  and  deserving 
of  the  colored  citizens.  He  would  have  been 
extremely  reluctant  to  subject  the  white  popula 
tion  of  the  South  to  what  he  would  have  realized 
they  must  feel  as  so  gross  a  wrong  and  humilia 
tion,  or  to  impose  on  them  as  voters  an  ignorant 
proletariat  of  a  different  race,  the  mass  of  whom 
were  totally  unfit  for  the  ballot,  whose  number 
in  all  the  seceding  states  taken  together  was 
only  one-fifth  less  than  that  of  the  whites,  while 
in  three  of  these  states  it  actually  exceeded  it. 
In  the  end  Congress  gave  the  colored  people  the 
ballot,  as  essential  to  their  protection  ;  but  the 
race  problem  at  the  South,  even  though  the  out 
look  should  be  thought  hopeful,  is  by  no  means 
yet  settled. 

There  were  persons  both  in  Congress  and  in 
the  country  who  thought  that  the  accession  of 
Johnson  to  the  presidency  would  save  us  from 
the  consequences  of  what  seemed  to  then)  Lin 
coln's  ill-advised  leniency  and  trust.  A  caucus 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    407 

of  politicians  holding  these  views  was  held  on 
the  very  day  of  Lincoln's  death,  to  consider  the 
questions  of  a  new  cabinet  and  of  a  less  con 
ciliatory  policy  ;  and  on  the  next  morning  the 
chairman  of  the  reconstruction  committee  said 
to  the  new  President :  "  Johnson,  we  have  faith 
in  you.  By  the  gods,  there  will  be  no  trouble 
now  in  running  the  government." 

Both  before  and  after  his  inauguration,  John 
son  had  talked  of  treason  as  a  crime  to  be  pun 
ished,  and  this  and  similar  sayings  of  his  had 
created  an  impression  that  he  would  make 
harder  terms  with  the  states  in  rebellion,  before 
permitting  them  to  get  back  into  their  "  proper 
practical  relations  with  the  Union,"  than  Lin 
coln  would  have  done.  But  no  such  inference  is 
fairly  to  be  drawn  from  what  he  had  said.  He 
was  speaking,  not  of  harshness  to  communities, 
but  of  the  punishment  of  individuals,  and  hoped 
for  convictions  for  treason  just  as  he  desired  the 
condemnation  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  assassins.  The 
legal  and  practical  difficulties  in  the  way  of  ob 
taining  such  convictions  he  realized  later. 

The  thirty-eighth  Congress  had  expired  with 
the  close  of  Lincoln's  first  administration ;  and 
unless  the  President  should  call  an  extra  session, 
it  would  be  nearly  nine  months  before  the  new 
Congress  met.  Johnson  did  not  call  it  together 
sooner ;  in  this  he  followed  the  plan  of  Mr. 


408  WILL  1 AM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

Lincoln,  who  had  thought  it  fortunate  that 
there  was  to  be  so  long  an  interval  between  the 
end  of  the  rebellion  and  the  coming  together 
of  Congress.  Johnson's  constitutional  opinions 
were  well  known.  He  believed  the  Union  in 
tact,  and  that  it  included  as  well  the  states  which 
had  undertaken  to  secede  as  those  which  had  re 
mained  loyal.  "  It  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Con 
stitution,"  he  had  said,  "that  no  state  can  go 
out  of  this  Union,  and  morever  Congress  cannot 
eject  a  state  from  this  Union."  He  had  resigned 
his  seat  in  the  Senate  of  the  United  States,  and 
gone  to  Tennessee  at  Mr.  Lincoln's  solicitation, 
as  military  governor,  to  facilitate  the  resumption 
by  that  State  of  her  proper  relations  to  the  Fed 
eral  government;  he  had  initiated  the  measures 
necessary  for  this  purpose,  accepting  and  acting 
upon  the  policy  which  Lincoln  had  employed 
in  Louisiana,  —  that  civil  government  should  be 
substituted  for  military  rule  whenever  armed  re 
sistance  had  ceased,  and  the  President,  as  Com- 
mander-in-Chief,  was  satisfied  that  the  people 
of  a  state  were  prepared  loyally  to  accept  and 
abide  by  the  results  of  the  struggle,  however 
bitter  they  might  feel  them  to  be.  It  would 
have  been  impossible  for  Johnson  to  hold  any 
other  opinion  upon  the  constitutional  questions 
involved  in  the  rebellion.  Only  upon  the  theory 
that  Tennessee,  in  spite  of  the  ordinance  of  se- 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER   JOHNSON.    409 

cession,  was  still  an  integral  part  of  the  Union 
could  he  properly  have  retained  his  seat  as  sen 
ator  from  that  state,  or  been  nominated  and 
elected  as  vice-president,  or  be  now  discharg 
ing  the  duties  of  President  of  the  United  States. 

O 

This  opinion  was  not  the  outcome  of  his  con 
troversy  with  Congress  ;  it  was  his  settled  con 
viction  before  any  controversy  arose,  and  it 
governed  all  his  official  action  on  the  different 
reconstruction  measures  that  came  before  him. 

Early  in  May,  1865,  he  issued  a  proclamation 
announcing  that  hostilities  had  ceased.  Three 
weeks  later  he  published  a  proclamation  of  am 
nesty,  the  terms  of  which  were  identical  with 
those  granted  by  Lincoln,  except  that  he  added 
seven  more  to  the  classes  of  persons  excluded 
from  the  benefits  of  the  former  proclamation. 
No  criticisms  were  made  as  to  any  of  these  ad 
ditions,  unless  it  be  as  to  the  last,  which  shut 
out  from  the  right  to  a  pardon  "  all  voluntary 
participants  in  the  rebellion  having  more  than 
twenty  thousand  dollars  worth  of  taxable  pro 
perty."  He  has  been  charged  with  having 
inserted  this  for  the  purpose  of  striking  at  a 
class  of  men  "  whom  he  personally  hated ;  "  but 
the  accusation  seems  unjust.  This  exception 
would  not  strike  the  aristocratic  slaveholders, 
who  had  lost  everything  by  the  extinction  of 
slavery,  and  of  whom  Johnson  might  personally 


410  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

complain,  but  the  prosperous  business  men  and 
traders,  earnest  Southern  sympathizers,  active 
and  influential  in  promoting  the  rebellion,  of 
whom  Johnson  had  just  had  experience  in  Ten 
nessee,  who  were  not  included  in  any  of  the 
previously  excepted  classes,  but  who  were  in  his 
opinion  equally  undeserving  of  pardon. 

There  was  also  added  to  this  proclamation 
a  clause  that  "  special  applications  for  pardon 
might  be  made  by  any  one  belonging  to  the  ex 
cepted  classes,  and  that  such  clemency  would  be 
extended  him  as  might  be  consistent  with  the 
facts  of  the  case  and  the  peace  and  dignity  of 
the  United  States."  It  has  been  said  that  this 
clause  was  inserted  at  Se ward's  instance,  and 
that  he  favored  it  for  various  petty  reasons,  as 
it  is  also  asserted  that  he  resisted  as  long  as 
he  could  the  previous  clause  excepting  men  of 
property.  What  foundation  there  may  be  for 
these  assertions  it  is  difficult  to  ascertain,  but  the 
imputation  of  low  motives  is  a  purely  gratui 
tous  aspersion.  The  final  clause  is  an  extremely 
proper  one,  and  should  not  have  been  omitted. 
It  was  substantially  copied  by  Congress  when  it 
had  succeeded  in  obtaining  control  of  the  whole 
subject  of  reconstruction  ; 1  and  the  reasons  for 
its  insertion  were  in  each  case  the  same.  That 
the  clemency  sanctioned  by  this  clause  was 

1  XlVth  Amendment  to  Constitution,  Sec.  iii. 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    411 

abused  is  unquestionable  ;  but  this  is  no  reason 
for  altogether  omitting  the  clause.  The  par 
doning  power  is  often  improperly  exercised,  but 
the  necessity  for  its  existence  is  universally  ad 
mitted.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  Congress 
made  mistakes  as  to  some  of  the  persons  whom  it 
rehabilitated  under  the  provisions  of  the  recon 
struction  acts. 

On  the  day  that  this  proclamation  was  issued, 
Johnson  appointed  a  provisional  governor  for 
North  Carolina,  and  before  the  middle  of  July 
had  made  similar  appointments  for  the  other 
rebel  states  for  whose  government  there  were  no 
existing  provisions.  These  officers  were  directed 
to  take  measures  to  call  conventions  to  be  com 
posed  of  delegates  chosen  by  the  loyal  voters  of 
the  respective  states.  These  voters  were  defined 
to  be  those  persons,  possessing  the  qualifications 
required  by  the  laws  of  the  state  before  its 
secession,  who  were  entitled  to  the  benefits  of 
the  amnesty  proclamation,  and  who  had  taken 
the  prescribed  oath.  These  requirements  fol 
lowed  the  precedents  established  by  Lincoln  in 
Louisiana,  Arkansas,  and  Tennessee,  and  re 
stricted  the  suffrage  to  white  men.  The  object 
of  each  convention  was  declared  to  be  to  secure 
to  its  state  that  republican  form  of  government 
guaranteed  by  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States ;  the  insurrection  having  deprived  the 


412  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

states  in  rebellion  of  all  recognized  civil  gov 
ernments.  The  convention,  or  the  subsequent 
legislature  in  each  state,  was  to  prescribe,  it  was 
said  by  the  President,  "  the  qualifications  of 
electors,  and  the  eligibility  of  persons  to  hold 
office  under  the  constitution  and  laws  of  the 
state,1  a  power  the  people  of  the  several  states 
composing  the  Federal  Union  have  rightfully 
exercised  from  the  origin  of  the  government 
until  the  present  time" 

This  last  sentence  emphasizes  one  point  in 
the  differences  between  Congress  and  himself. 
The  bill  of  the  previous  July  had  insisted  that 
the  state  constitutions  to  be  adopted  must  pro 
vide  that  no  Confederate  officer  of  rank  or  im 
portance,  civil  or  military,  should  ever  vote  for, 
or  be,  governor,  or  a  member  of  the  legislature ; 
and  the  President  now  declared  that  in  his 
opinion  these  were  matters  to  be  determined  not 
by  Congressional  dictation,  but,  as  they  always 
had  been,  by  the  several  states,  each  for  itself, 
and  that  the  Southern  states  had  not  by  the 
rebellion  lost  the  right  to  do  this.  Both  the 
President  and  Congress,  however,  were  agreed 
that  something  was  required,  as  proof  that  the 
rebellion  was  really  over,  before  the  troops  could 
be  properly  withdrawn  and  the  people  of  any 

1  Lincoln  took  a  similar  view  as  to  the  work  of  the  Louisi 
ana  convention.    N.  &  H.  viii.  p.  434. 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    413 

seceding  state  be  permitted  to  organize  a  civil 
government  and  resume  their  old  relations  to 
the  Union  ;  they  were  also  agreed  that  some  oath 
should  be  required  of  these  people.  The  Presi 
dent  during  this  summer  had  further  insisted 
with  each  of  these  states  upon  its  abolition  of 
slavery,  its  ratification  of  the  thirteenth  consti 
tutional  amendment,  which  forever  prohibited 
slavery,  and  its  absolute  repudiation  of  all  rebel 
war  debts,  declaring  that  he  could  "  not  recog 
nize  the  people  of  any  state  as  having  resumed 
the  relations  of  loyalty  to  the  Union,  who  ad 
mitted  the  legality  of  obligations  contracted  or 
debts  created  in  their  name  to  promote  the  war 
of  the  rebellion." 

In  all  that  he  was  doing  the  President  as 
sumed  to  act  in  the  exercise  of  the  war  power, 
and  by  virtue  of  his  authority  as  Commander-in- 
Chief.  For  any  legislation  by  Congress  author 
ity  must  be  fouiad  either  in  the  Constitution 
itself,  —  where  the  only  clause  which  seemed  to 
have  any  bearing  on  the  matter  was  that  which 
makes  each  House  the  judge  of  the  elections, 
returns  and  qualifications  of  its  own  members, 
—  or  in  the  assumption  that  the  seceding  states 
had  forfeited  all  their  constitutional  rights,  were 
to  be  treated  like  any  conquered  people,  and 
that  therefore  Congress  had  absolute  authority 
over  them.  This  assumption  is  the  ground  upon 


414  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

which  the  constitutionality  of  the  reconstruc 
tion  act  of  March  2,  1867,  is  to  be  defended ; 
yet  in  this  very  act  Congress  showed  its  want 
of  confidence  in  the  soundness  of  this  theory. 
It  recognized  these  states  as  constituent  mem 
bers  of  the  Union  for  the  purpose  of  voting  on 
the  fourteenth  constitutional  amendment,  while 
with  a  palpable  inconsistency  it  denied  them 
their  right  of  representation,  unless  they  voted 
in  a  particular  way.  This  theory  was  origi 
nally  propounded  by  Thaddeus  Stevens  in  the 
House  and  by  Sumner  in  the  Senate,  in  the 
resolve  already  quoted.  It  was  never  thoroughly 
accepted  even  in  Congress,  was  not  sustained 
by  the  Supreme  Court,  was  never  believed  in 
by  Lincoln,  and  was  denied  by  many  leading 
statesmen  and  jurists.1 

It  has  been  asserted  that  Johnson,2  after  he 

1  To  get  the  votes  of  those  who  could  not  accept  Stevens' 
theory,  the  reconstruction  acts  were  declared  to  be  an  exercise 
of  authority  under  that  clause  of  the  Constitution  by  which 
the  United  States  is  to  guarantee  to  every  state  in  the  Union  a 
republican  form  of  government.  This  declaration  afterward 
found  support  in  the  opinion  of  Chief  Justice  Chase  in  Texas 
v.  White  (7  Wallace,  700).  To  maintain  this  view,  however, 
seems  to  oblige  one  to  do  violence  to  the  natural  and  obvious 
meaning  of  this  clause,  and  to  give  it  an  effect  certainly  never 
contemplated  by  the  makers  of  the  Constitution. 

2  This  is  the  view  of  Mr.  Blaine  ;  but  General  Grant,  whose 
relations  with  the  President  entitle  his  conclusions  to  much 
more  weight,  "  thought  the  plan  the  child  of  Johnson's  own 
brain." 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    415 

became  President,  changed  his  whole  opinion 
of  the  proper  policy  to  be  pursued  towards  the 
seceding  states,  and  that  this  change  was  owing 
to  Seward's  persuasive  powers  and  the  immense 
influence  he  had  thereby  acquired  over  the  Pres 
ident.  The  two  statements  depend  on  each 
other ;  if  there  was  no  such  change  in  the  Presi 
dent,  then  it  was  certainly  not  caused  by  Sew 
ard's  influence.  The  real  difficulty  with  John 
son  was  exactly  the  opposite  one,  —  the  obstinacy 
with  which  he  adhered  to  his  policy  towards 
the  South,  after  it  became  evident  that  it  was  a 
mistake  and  a  failure.  The  persons  who  charge 
the  President  with  reversing  his  entire  policy 
towards  the  South  have  confounded  two  things 

O 

which  Johnson  himself  kept  quite  distinct,  the 
proper  treatment  of  individual  wrongdoers,  the 
leaders  in  rebellion,  for  whom  he  thought  no  pun 
ishment  too  severe,  and  the  leniency  to  be  shown 
to  the  communities  who  had  followed  their  guid 
ance,  whom  he  was  always  disposed  to  treat  with 
the  utmost  consideration.  His  opinions  upon 
constitutional  questions  were  those  he  had  main 
tained  before  his  election  as  Vice-President.  He 
believed  that  the  Union  was  indissoluble  ;  that 
the  Constitution  secured  certain  rights  to  the 
states  as  well  as  to  the  Federal  government; 
that  though  the  exercise  of  these  rights  on  the 
one  side  or  the  other  might  be  for  a  time  sus- 


416  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

pended  or  prevented,  the  rights  themselves  could 
not  be  forfeited  or  lost ;  and  his  course  as  Pres 
ident  and  all  his  vetoes  were  not  merely  consist 
ent  with  this  view,  they  depended  upon  it  and 
were  its  logical  outcome.  In  appointing  provis 
ional  governors  of  the  several  rebel  states,  and 
in  all  that  he  did  towards  bringing  them  back 
to  their  true  position  as  an  integral  part  of  the 
Union,  he  believed  himself  to  be  carefully  fol 
lowing  in  Lincoln's  footsteps.  He  undoubtedly 
hoped  and  expected  in  this  way  to  convert  re 
pentant  rebels  into  loyal  Unionists  ;  yet  before 
Congress  met,  he  had  ample  evidence,  if  he  had 
chosen  to  heed  it,  that  the  Southerners  were 
neither  loyal  nor  submissive,  but  absolutely  un- 
regenerate  and  untrustworthy.  Had  he  been  a 
man  of  a  different  nature  he  would  have  se'en 
this,  and  would  have  modified  his  treatment  of 
them  when  he  found  that  it  was  resulting  in  the 
restoration  of  authority  to  insurgents,  who,  while 
laying  down  their  arms,  retained  their  hostil 
ity  to  the  government  that  had  compelled  their 
submission.  But  he  had  neither  the  perception, 
nor  the  flexibility  nor  the  breadth  of  mind  ne 
cessary  for  this.  He  was  a  person  essentially 
narrow,  obstinate,  and  conceited,  was  coarse  and 
vulgar  and  possessed  of  a  very  bad  temper  which 
caused  him  to  lose  his  head  when  it  got  the 
mastery.  He  was  like  many  common  men,  con- 


SECRETARY   OF   STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    417 

scions  of  his  defects,  very  sensitive  to  ridicule  or 
to  any  mark  of  disrespect,  and  easily  affected  by 
attentions  or  even  gross  flattery.  He  had  made 
an  unfortunate  exhibition  of  himself  on  inaugu 
ration  day,  and  never  forgot  that  Sumner  had 
urged  that,  in  consequence  of  this,  he  should  be 
requested  to  resign.  His  first  message  in  De 
cember,  1865,  shows,  however,  that  he  had  then 
no  wish  or  expectation  of  quarreling  with  Con 
gress.  But  in  little  more  than  a  month  after 
the  beginning  of  the  session,  a  resolution  offered 
by  a  Republican,  expressing  confidence  in  the 
President  and  in  his  cooperation  with  Congress 
in  restoring  to  their  equal  position  and  rights 
the  states  lately  in  insurrection,  was  buried  by 
sending  it  to  the  committee  on  reconstruction ; 
and  Johnson  felt  most  keenly  the  indignity  thus 
offered  him  by  his  own  party. 

In  his  message  in  December  the  President 
had  stated  correctly  the  alternative  modes  of 
dealing  with  the  Southern  states.  They  must 
either  be  retained  under  military  subjection  for  a 
period  longer  or  shorter  as  circumstances  might 
require,  or  they  must  be  brought  back  into 
practical  relations  with  the  Union,  as  quickly 
as  possible,  by  methods  which  necessarily  im 
plied  a  trust  in  the  loyalty  of  the  people.  The 
objections  to  the  former  scheme  were,  that  it 
was  opposed  to  all  our  ideas  as  to  the  right 


418  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

of  self-government,  and  that  it  assumed  that 
the  seceding  states  were  practically  out  of  the 
Union,  and  that  the  South  was  a  conquered 
country  over  which  we  had  full  power.  The  ob 
jections  to  the  latter  course  were,  that  it  seemed 
to  impose  no  penalty  on  rebellion,  and  that  its 
success  depended  upon  the  existence  at  the 
South  of  a  sufficient  body  of  people  loyal  to  the 
United  States,  and  prepared  to  accept  the  re 
sults  of  the  war.  Lincoln  and  Johnson  both 
believed  in  the  existence  of  such  a  body,  large 
enough  to  form  and  organize  state  governments 
and  to  serve  as  a  nucleus  round  which  the  mass 
of  the  citizens  would  crystallize.  In  this  belief 
time  showed  that  they  were  mistaken,  and  that 
the  four  years  of  war  had  substantially  extin 
guished  for  the  time  the  Union  sentiment  in  the 
seceding  states,  as  it  had  destroyed  the  peace 
Democracy  at  the  North.  The  Congressional 
plan  of  reconstruction,  which  was  finally  adopted, 
assumed  that  the  North  had  prevailed  in  a  war 
of  conquest,  and  had  the  conquerors'  right  to 
deal  with  the  Southerners  as  a  subjugated  peo 
ple.  Johnson  opposed  this  plan  by  all  the 
means  in  his  power.  The  contest  between  him 
and  Congress  was  most  bitter ;  it  was  carried  on 
by  vetoes  on  the  one  side,  and  by  the  passage  of 
bills  over  these  vetoes  on  the  other,  by  attacks 
of  the  President  on  Congress  in  various  public 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER   JOHNSON.    419 

addresses,  while  in  Congress  there  were  attacks 
upon  him,  equally  bitter  and  unjustifiable,  which 
resulted  in  an  impeachment  and  a  trial,  upon 
which  no  man  not  a  partisan  can  reflect  without 
a  sense  of  shame. 

Before  Lincoln's  death  an  act  of  Congress  had 
established  the  freedmen's  bureau.  Early  in 
1866  a  bill  was  passed  enlarging  the  powers  of 
this  bureau,  and  extending  the  period  of  its 
existence.  This  bill  the  President  vetoed  on 
constitutional  and  other  grounds,  and  his  veto 
was  sustained.  A  second  bill  was  then  intro 
duced,  drawn  not  with  a  view  to  overcoming  the 
President's  objections  and  obtaining  his  approval, 
but  with  regard  to  the  ability  to  pass  it  over  his 
veto,  which  was  done  on  the  same  day  that  the 
veto  message  was  received  (July  16,  1866). 
"  It  required,  however,  potent  persuasion  rein 
forced  by  the  severest  party  discipline  to  prevent 
a  serious  break  in  both  houses  against  the  bill," 
and  to  carry  it  over  the  veto. 

In  April,  before  the  passage  of  this  act,  a  civil 
rights  bill,  giving  to  the  colored  people  in  every 
state  equal  civil  rights  with  the  whites,  had  also 
been  passed  over  the  President's  veto  ;  but  to 
secure  the  majority  required  to  do  this,  it  had 
been  found  necessary  to  unseat  by  a  strict  party 
vote  a  Democrat,  who  would  otherwise  have 
retained  his  place  in  the  Senate,  and  to  insist 


420  WILL  [AM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

upon  a  vote,  when  one  of  the  Republicans  who 
sided  with  the  President  was  ill  and  unable  to 
be  in  his  seat.  In  December,  1865,  Congress 
had  passed  the  thirteenth  amendment  to  the 
Constitution.  This  prohibited  slavery  every 
where.  In  June  (1866)  they  passed  the  four 
teenth  amendment  which  declared  all  persons 
born  or  naturalized  here  to  be  citizens,  prohibited 
any  state  from  abridging  their  privileges  or 
immunities,  and  proportionally  reduced  the  re 
presentation  in  Congress  and  in  the  electoral 
college  of  any  state  which  denied  to  any  of  its 
male  citizens  the  right  of  suffrage.  This  amend 
ment  also  prohibited  any  person,  who,  having 
taken  an  oath  to  support  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States,  had  engaged  in  insurrection,  from 
holding  any  office  under  the  United  States  or  in 
any  state,  unless  this  disability  should  have  been 
removed  by  a  two-thirds  vote  of  both  houses  of 
Congress.  The  proposed  amendment  was  no 
affair  of  the  President's,  but  he  very  unwisely 
sent  to  Congress  a  message  expressing  his  disap 
proval  of  it. 

By  a  series  of  offensive  speeches,  beginning 
on  Washington's  birthday  and  culminating  in 
those  which  he  delivered  at  various  places  during 
a  summer  tour  in  1866,  Johnson  had  succeeded 
in  utterly  disgusting  the  people,  and  had  wholly 
lost  the  confidence  of  the  country.  The  autumn 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    421 

elections  went  decidedly  against  him,  and  gave 
to  Congress  a  free  hand.  In  the  following 
year  they  passed  the  military  reconstruction  bill, 
which  laid  down  the  conditions  required  of  any 
state  to  obtain  the  admission  of  its  senators  and 
representatives  to  Congress,  and  the  counting 
of  its  votes  in  the  electoral  college.  These  con 
ditions  were:  the  adoption  of  a  constitution 
which  granted  universal  suffrage,  which  abol 
ished  slavery  forever,  which  prohibited  the  pay 
ment  of  any  rebel  war  debt,  which  secured  ab 
solute  equality  between  all  classes  of  citizens  ; 
and  the  ratification  by  the  state  of  both  the 
thirteenth  and  fourteenth  amendments  to  the 
constitution.  To  these  was  added  one  further 
condition.  No  state  in  insurrection  was  to  be 
admitted  to  representation  in  Congress  or  in  the 
electoral  college  until  the  thirteenth  and  four 
teenth  amendments  had  become  part  of  the 
Constitution  by  the  ratification  of  two  thirds  of 
the  states.  Meantime  the  Southern  states  were 
divided  into  various  military  districts,  several 
states  being  united  for  this  purpose,  and  placed 
under  a  single  command.  This  bill  was  vetoed 
by  the  President,  but  was  passed  over  the  veto. 
This  was  the  plan  of  reconstruction  which  was 
finally  carried  out.  Whether  it  would  have 
worked  satisfactorily  had  the  President  and 
Congress  been  cordially  at  one  in  endeavoring 


422  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

to  promote  its  success,  is  uncertain.  Before  it 
was  adopted  the  President's  plan  had  failed. 
Unrepentant  rebels  had  got  control  of  state  gov 
ernments  which  he  had  recognized  ;  there  were 
outrages  and  riots,  and  though  slavery  had  been 
technically  abolished,  vagrant  and  apprentice 
laws  had  been  passed  in  several  of  the  Southern 
states,  the  purpose  and  effect  of  which  was  to 
reduce  the  colored  people  to  a  condition  anal 
ogous  to  that  from  which  they  were  supposed 
to  have  been  freed.  The  seceding  states  at  last 
accepted  the  terms  which  Congress  had  pre 
scribed,  but  only  because  they  found  there  was 
no  escape  from  doing  so,  if  they  wished  to  be 
represented  in  the  House  and  Senate ;  in  1868 
they  all,  with  the  exception  of  Virginia,  Missis 
sippi,  and  Texas,  were  readmitted  to  the  Union. 
The  three  states  last  named  were  brought  back 
in  1870.  Although  the  states  had  accepted  these 
conditions  for  the  purpose  of  obtaining  their  old 
rights,  they  felt  that  they  were  not  bound  to 
observe  in  good  faith  the  requirements  which 
had  been  forced  upon  them,  and  for  several  years 
they  resorted  to  all  sorts  of  expedients  to  deprive 
the  freedmen  of  the  free  and  fair  exercise  of 
the  suffrage  to  which  they  were  legally  entitled. 
The  success  of  the  congressional  reconstruction 
scheme  was  therefore  by  no  means  an  unquali 
fied  one.  It  was  disapproved  of  at  the  time 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    423 

by  some  of  the  leaders  and  by  a  number  of  the 
members  of  the  Republican  party,  and  it  had  a 
considerable  influence  in  inducing  many  of  the 
most  conservative  of  them  to  join  at  last  the 
ranks  of  the  Democracy. 

Though  the  President's  reconstruction  policy 
was  not  inspired  by  Seward,  but  had  its  origin 
in  Johnson's  own  convictions  as  to  the  proper 
construction  of  the  Constitution  and  the  true 
position  of  the  seceding  states,  and  was  in  har 
mony  with  that  which  he  had  with  Lincoln's 
approval  pursued  in  Tennessee,  yet  it  was  the 
logical  sequel  of  the  doctrines  reiterated  by 
Seward  again  and  again  in  his  despatches  as 
secretary  of  state.1 

It  would  have  been  obviously  impossible  for 
Seward,  after  having  labored  for  four  years  to 
satisfy  the  governments  of  Europe  that  the 
Union  was  intact,  that  we  were  engaged  in 
quelling  an  insurrection  and  were  not  embarked 
in  a  war  of  conquest,  to  deny  his  own  instruc 
tions  and  assent  to  the  new  congressional  theo- 

1  In  Senator  Sherman's  Recollections,  published  since  this 
chapter  was  written,  he  says  :  "  After  this  long  lapse  of  time 
I  am  convinced  that  Mr.  Johnson's  scheme  of  reconstruction 
was  wise  and  judicious."  [Vol.  i.  p.  361.]  Was  it  not  the  hos 
tility  between  Congress  and  the  President,  rather  than  John 
son's  policy,  that  encouraged  the  subdued  secessionists  to  try 
to  evade  the  legislation  of  four  years  and  escape  the  conse 
quences  of  their  unsuccessful  rebellion  ? 


424  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

ries  and  to  the  legislation  which  followed  them. 
He  thought  the  course  of  Congress  unwise  as 
well  as  unconstitutional ;  he  believed  in  the 
President's  honesty  of  purpose,  the  soundness 
of  his  constitutional  views  and  the  correctness 
of  his  vetoes,  and  holding  these  opinions  saw  no 
reason  why  he  should  leave  the  cabinet.  He 
regretted  extremely  the  dissensions  which  had 
arisen  from  the  differences  of  opinion  as  to  the 
best  mode  of  reconstruction  ;  but  did  not  con 
sider  these  differences  or  dissensions  as  of  pri 
mary  importance.  He  had  no  doubt  that  the 
states  which  had  ceased  their  resistance  in  the 
field  would  in  some  way,  after  no  long  delay, 
come  again  into  the  full  enjoyment  of  their 
privileges  as  members  of  the  Union ;  and  that 
time  would  not  merely  heal  the  wounds  of  the 
war,  but  would  also  efface  any  bitterness  which 
might  follow  the  harsh  measures  of  Congress ; 
and  so  believing,  he  was  not  a  violent  partisan 
of  either  party.  Speaking  at  the  Cooper  Insti 
tute  on  Washington's  birthday,  he  said :  "  I  am 
not  here  as  an  alarmist ;  I  am  not  here  to  say 
that  the  nation  is  in  peril  or  danger  —  in  peril 
if  you  adopt  the  opinions  of  the  President ;  in 
peril  if  you  reject  them ;  in  peril  if  you  adopt 
the  views  of  the  apparent  or  real  majority  of 
Congress,  or  if  you  reject  them.  Nor  do  I  think 
the  cause  of  liberty  and  human  freedom,  the 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    425 

cause  of  progress  or  civilization,  the  cause  of 
national  aggrandizement  present  or  future,  mate 
rial  or  moral,  is  in  danger  of  being  long  arrested, 
whether  you  adopt  one  set  of  political  opinions 
or  another.  The  Union  has  been  rescued  from 
all  its  perils.  The  noble  ship  has  passed  from 
tempest  and  billows  within  the  verge  of  a  safe 
harbor,  without  a  broken  spar  or  a  leak,  star 
board  or  larboard,  fore  or  aft.  There  are  some 
small  reefs  yet  to  pass  as  she  approaches  her 
moorings.  One  pilot  says  that  she  may  safely 
enter  directly  through  them.  The  other  says 
that  she  must  back,  and,  lowering  sail,  take  time 
to  go  around  them.  That  is  all  the  difference 
of  opinion  between  the  pilots.  I  should  not 
practice  my  habitual  charity  if  I  did  not  admit 
that  I  think  them  both  sincere  and  honest.  But 
the  vessel  will  go  in  safely,  one  way  or  the  other. 
The  worst  that  need  happen  will  be  that,  by 
taking  the  wrong  instead  of  the  right  passage, 
or  even  taking  the  right  passage  and  avoiding 
the  wrong  one,  the  vessel  may  roll  a  little,  and 
some  honest,  capable,  and  even  deserving  politi 
cians,  statesmen,  president,  or  congressmen  may 
get  washed  overboard.  I  should  be  sorry  for 
this,  but  if  it  cannot  be  helped,  it  can  be  borne. 
If  I  am  one  of  the  unfortunates,  let  no  friend 
be  concerned  on  that  account." 

Seward   had  remained  in   the   cabinet,  how- 


426  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

ever,  not  so  much  to  take  part  in  the  process 
of  reconstruction  as  because  he  wished  to  dis 
pose  of  the  diplomatic  questions  which  the  war 
had  left  unsettled,  and  thus  to  finish  his  work. 
These,  the  proper  duties  of  his  office,  he  found 
much  less  onerous  than  during  the  war,  and 
more  fruitful  and  agreeable  in  their  results. 
With  the  various  states  of  Central  and  South 
America  he  made  treaties  for  the  settlement  of 
all  outstanding  claims  ;  and  with  Nicaragua, 
one  containing  stipulations  for  a  transit  between 
the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  oceans,  the  Nicaragua 
Canal.  As  has  already  been  stated,  the  French 
were  induced  by  negotiations,  and  without  a 
resort  to  war  on  our  part,  to  withdraw  their 
troops  from  Mexico,  and  the  republican  govern 
ment  was  reestablished  there,  though  its  advent 
to  power  was  stained  by  the  execution  of  Maxi 
milian,  whose  life  Seward's  exertions  were  un 
able  to  save. 

The  European  governments  had  always  denied 
the  right  of  any  native-born  subject  to  cast  off 
his  allegiance  to  his  own  country  and  to  become 
a  citizen  of  an  adopted  one.  Our  naturalization 
laws  permitted  a  foreigner  to  do  this,  and  per 
sonal  complications  were  constantly  arising  on 
account  of  this  difference.  Seward  succeeded, 
at  first  with  Prussia  and  afterwards  with  various 
other  countries  of  Europe,  in  arranging  this 


SECRETARY    OF   STATE    UNDER  JOHNSON.    427 

matter  011  a  satisfactory  basis.  He  also  made 
a  treaty  with  the  Island  of  Madagascar  which 
opened  to  us  trade  and  commerce  there,  and  un 
der  which  this  country  absorbed  about  two  thirds 
of  the  entire  foreign  business  of  that  island,  and 
retained  it  until  the  recent  conquest  and  annex 
ation  of  Madagascar  by  France. 

Any  practical  discussion  of  the  Alabama 
claims  was  negatived  by  Lord  Russell's  emphatic 
refusal  to  admit  England's  liability  on  this  ac 
count  ;  this  matter  therefore  remained  in  abey 
ance  until  the  change  of  ministry  in  1868.  Mr. 
Adams  had  resigned  at  the  close  of  the  previous 
year,  and  Reverdy  Johnson  had  been  sent  to 
England  in  his  place.  He  negotiated  with  Lord 
Clarendon  a  treaty  for  the  settlement  of  these 
claims,  which  was  known  as  the  Johnson-Claren 
don  treaty.  It  gave  to  the  United  States,  in 
substance,  all  that  it  got  by  the  treaty  of  Wash 
ington  ;  but  it  was  rejected  by  the  Senate,  upon 
the  ground  that  it  belittled,  by  its  form,  the 
work  to  be  done,  ignored  the  greater  national 
grievances,  and  contained  no  word  of  regret  for 
the  fact  that  American  commerce  had  been  swept 
from  the  sea  by  the  rebel  cruisers,  and  for  the 
enormous  loss  thus  inflicted  on  the  country. 

Though  the  actual  treaty  failed  to  be  ratified, 
Seward  had  secured  by  it  the  essential  conces 
sion,  —  an  admission  of  the  principle  of  arbi- 


428  WILLIAM   HENRY   SEWARD. 

tration  for  the  settlement  of  our  claims  against 
Great  Britain  for  the  losses  occasioned  by  these 
cruisers ;  and,  this  concession  once  made,  a  satis 
factory  treaty  was  sure  sooner  or  later  to  follow. 

The  most  important  and  successful  treaty  with 
which  Seward's  name  will  always  remain  as 
sociated,  was  that  for  the  purchase  of  Alaska. 
To  many  people  it  seemed  a  wild  and  visionary 
scheme  to  annex,  at  the  cost  of  more  than  seven 
millions  of  dollars,  this  frozen  region  of  the 
North  ;  but  Mr.  Sumner  was  induced  to  see  both 
its  political  and  pecuniary  value,  and  he  made 
these  so  clear  to  the  Senate  that  the  treaty  was 
easily  ratified.  Subsequent  events  have  justified 
its  wisdom  ;  Alaska  has  returned  to  the  treasury 
of  the  United  States  many  fold  the  original  pur 
chase  money. 

Another  treaty  to  which  Seward  attached 
great  importance,  that  for  the  purchase  from 
Denmark  of  the  island  of  St.  Thomas  in  the 
West  Indies,  failed  in  the  Senate,  partly,  one 
cannot  but  think,  because  of  the  bitter  enmity 
of  that  body  and  its  leaders  to  the  President. 
We  had  suffered  exceedingly  during  the  whole 
civil  war  from  the  want  of  a  foothold  and  a  har 
bor  of  our  own  in  the  West  Indies,  which  might 
serve  as  a  coaling  and  naval  station ;  and  the 
great  importance  of  a  possession  of  this  sort  to 
us,  in  any  war  in  which  we  might  be  either  neu- 


SECRETARY   OF  STATE    UNDER   JOHNSON.    429 

trals  or  belligerents,  had  been  recognized  by  our 
military  and  naval  commanders.  St.  Thomas 
fulfilled  exactly  the  desired  conditions.  A  small 
island,  with  a  limited  population,  its  purchase 
would  give  rise  to  no  embarrassing  questions  as 
to  how  its  people  should  be  governed,  or  as  to 
their  participation  in  the  public  affairs  of  this 
country.-  It  is  poor  in  agricultural  products 
and  resources,  but  has  a  magnificent  land-locked 
harbor ;  it  was  at  that  time  the  great  commer 
cial  entrepot  for  trade  with  Venezuela,  Porto 
Rico,  San  Domingo  and  Hayti,  and  the  princi 
pal  rendezvous  for  the  steam  packets  of  various 
important  West  India  lines  ;  it  had  a  population 
two-thirds  Protestant,  with  a  language  almost 
exclusively  English.  The  fact  that  its  agricultu 
ral  products  were  few,  and  that  it  suffered  from 
time  to  time,  like  other  tropical  islands,  from 
the  violent  disturbances  of  the  elements,  ren 
dered  it  no  less  valuable  or  important  to  us  for 
the  purposes  for  which  we  required  it. 

This  treaty  had  been  much  valued  by  Seward, 
and  was  vigorously  championed  by  him,  though 
it  was  not  finally  disposed  of  until  after  his  term 
of  office  had  expired.  "  It  became  a  part  of 
the  great  controversy  between  the  Executive 
and  Congress.  The  President  and  the  State  De 
partment  had  negotiated  this  treaty,  and  there 
fore,  if  for  no  other  reason,  the  Senate  would 


430  WILLIAM  HENRY   SEWARD. 

not  consent  to  it."1  There  were  questions  as 
to  the  price  to  be  paid,  and  other  financial  con 
siderations,  which  might  have  led  to  its  rejec 
tion  ;  but  the  judgment  of  practical  experts  like 
Secretary  Fox  and  Admiral  Porter,  that  the 
island  would  be  of  the  greatest  value  and  im 
portance  to  us  for  naval  purposes,  is  certainly 
entitled  to  far  more  weight  than  the  opinions, 
however  emphatic  and  decided,  of  those  persons 
who  had  no  such  special  knowledge  or  qualifica 
tions.  The  admiral  and  the  secretary  were  both 
strenuous  advocates  of  this  treaty. 

At  the  close  of  President  Johnson's  admin 
istration  Seward  resigned  his  office  and  left 
Washington.  "  I  never  saw  him,"  wrote  a 
friend  at  this  time,  "  more  happy  than  he  is 
now  ;  so  different  (without  his  stilts)  from  what 
he  has  been  the  last  ten  years." 

With  short  intervals  of  rest  at  home,  the  next 
two  years  and  a  half  were  spent  by  him  in 
travel.  He  visited  the  western  coast  of  America 
from  Alaska  to  Lower  California,  crossed  Mex 
ico  and  returned  by  the  West  Indies,  and  later 
made  a  journey  round  the  world,  of  which  an 
account  has  been  published,  taken  from  his  jour 
nals  and  dictation.  After  his  return  he  passed 
the  remainder  of  his  days,  either  in  his  home 
stead  at  Auburn,  or  in  his  son's  cottage  on 
1  Dawes's  Sumner,  282. 


RETIREMENT  FROM  PUBLIC  LIFE.         431 

Owasco  Lake.  Here,  with  his  strength  gradu 
ally  failing,  his  temper  always  serene  and  cheer 
ful,  his  mind  clear  and  untouched,  he  waited  the 
slow  approach  of  Death.  At  work  in  the  morn 
ing  with  his  adopted  daughter  on  his  notes  of 
travel,  he  lay  down  to  rest,  and  the  end  came. 
He  died  on  the  10th  of  October,  1872. 

It  may  not  be  entirely  amiss  here  to  say  a 
word  of  Seward  as  a  man.  In  all  the  relations 
of  private  life  he  was  most  admirable  :  a  devoted 
husband,  a  kind  and  sympathetic  father,  a  firm 
and  loyal  friend,  an  excellent  neighbor  and  cit 
izen.  The  bitter  disappointment  of  the  people 
of  Auburn  at  his  failure  to  receive  the  presi 
dential  nomination  in  1860  shows  the  love  they 
bore  him.  His  optimism  in  politics  and  in  life 
generally  was  not  merely  the  result  of  a  disposi 
tion  naturally  cheerful  and  buoyant,  but  of  a 
firm  faith  in  an  overruling  Providence.  His  in 
dustry  was  tireless,  his  capacity  for  work  enor 
mous.  He  often  wrote  far  into  the  night,  and 
during  the  years  of  his  active  practice  as  a 
lawyer  the  young  men  in  his  office  would  fre 
quently  find  in  the  morning  the  floor  of  his 
room  strewn  with  papers  which  he  had  written 
while  they  were  asleep. 

His  political  life  stretched  over  a  period  of 
nearly  forty  years,  occupied  with  the  discussion 
and  settlement  of  the  most  vital  and  exciting 


432  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

questions  both  by  legislation  and  war.  He  has 
been  charged  with  having  no  political  convic 
tions,  but  an  examination  of  liis  pubHccareer 
seems  to  prove  exactly  the  contrary!  From 
first  to  last  he  was  a  consistent  Whig.  lie  be 
lieved  in  and  advocated  a  protective  tariff,  in- 
•  ternal  improvements,  and  all  the  doctrines  which 
formed  the  policy  of  that  party.  His  hostility 
to  slavery  began  with  his  life  in  Georgia,  and 
what  he  saw  there,  while  he  was  yet  a  mere  lad. 
His  opposition  to  it  never  ceased  so  long  as 
slavery  in  any  form  was  a  political  question : 
and  he  had  the  satisfaction,  as  secretary  of 
state,  of  signing  his  name  not  merely  to  the 
Proclamation  of  Emancipation,  but  to  both  the 
Constitutional  amendments  which  secured  to 
the  colored  people  of  this  country  complete  civil 
equality  with  the  whites.  He  was  never,  how 
ever,  an  abolitionist.  He  was  a  steady  and  per 
sistent  advocate  of  gradual  and  compensated 
emancipation.  From  his  short  life  at  the  South 
he  realized  more  fully  perhaps  than  any  North 
ern  statesman  the  enormous  difficulties  and  em 
barrassments  which  the  sudden  and  violent  free 
ing  of  the  slaves  would  bring  about  at  the 
South  —  the  destruction  of  property  and  the 
temporary  ruin  of  all  industries  which  such  an 
emancipation  would  be  likely  to  cause  ;  and  he 
had  therefore  a  compassion  for  the  people  of 


RETIREMENT  FROM  PUBLIC  LIFE.         433 

that  region,  rebels  though  they  had  been,  which 
people  at  the  North  could  hardly  understand. 

He  not  only  had  convictions,  but  he  had  the 
courage  of   his   convictions,   and  did  not  hesi 
tate  to  separate  himself    from    his    friends,    to 
oppose  his  party  or  to  risk  his  own  popularity 
in  support  of  these  convictions.     His  defense  of 
the  poor  negro  Freeman  is  a  striking  example 
of  this.     His  political  life  is  full  of  illustrations 
of  the  same  quality.     His  persistent  support  of 
what  he  regarded  as  the  rights  of  the  Roman 
Catholics  in  the  public  schools,  and  his  opposi 
tion  to  the  Know-nothing  party,  which  cost  him 
his  nomination  at  Chicago,  are  marked  instances 
of  it.     His  political  controversies  never  degen 
erated  into  personalities.     He  gave  to  his  oppo 
nents  the  same  credit  for  honesty  of  conviction 
which  he  expected  them  to  accord  to  him,  and 
numbered  among  his  friends  many  of  those  who 
in  public  life  were  his  political  opponents.     He 
was  not  a  shrewd  political  manager ;  he  trusted 
to  others  to  manage  for  him.     Perfectly  clean 
handed  himself,  by  the  admission  of  those  who 
had  the  least  confidence  in  him,  he  may  have 
permitted  his  political  managers  and  friends  to 
do  what  they  thought  was  for  his  interest ;  but 
he  knew  very  little  about  this  ;  he  surrendered 
himself  entirely  into  their  hands,  and  had  to 
bear  the  consequences  of  their  mistakes,  as  well 


434  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

as  receive  the  benefit  of  their  successes.  The 
severest  judgments  on  him  came  from  members 
of  his  own  party,  from  whom  he  happened  to 
differ  as  to  a  particular  measure  or  policy,  who 
were  not  clear  sighted  enough  to  see,  as  he  did, 
that  "  one  half  the  effort  of  the  anti-slavery  men 
was  lost,  because  it  consisted  of  the  incrimina- 
tion  of  other  anti-slavery  men  for  shades  of  dif- 
erence  of  opinion  ;  and  that  the  field  was  broad 
enough  for  all." 

He  was  most  severely  attacked,  however,  by 
the  leaders  of  his  own  party  for  remaining  in 
Johnson's  cabinet ;  and  they  spoke  of  him  and 
treated  him  as  a  traitor.  It  would  have  been 
easier  and  pleasanter  for  him  to  have  resigned, 
but  to  abandon  Johnson  under  the  actual  cir 
cumstances  would  have  seemed  to  Seward  like 
desertion,  and  he  had  to  bring  himself  to  bear, 
with  such  equanimity  as  he  was  master  of,  his 
old  friends'  avoidance  of  him.  The  cordial  wel 
come  he  received,  and  the  honors  paid  him  in  all 
parts  of  the  world  during  the  next  two  years 
must  have  served  to  efface  the  recollection  of 
this  coldness  and  neglect.  Though  he  never 
recovered  his  vigor  of  body  after  his  injuries  in 
1865,  the  activity  of  his  mind  was  inexhaustible. 
He  planned  his  travels,  lest  "  rest  should  mean 
rust,"  and  with  the  thought  that  the  study  of 
mankind  would  be  the  most  interesting  and  least 


RETIREMENT  FROM  PUBLIC  LIFE.        435 

fatiguing  pursuit  for  him.  He  might  have  ex 
pected  a  kindly  welcome  in  California,  for  whose 
admission  as  a  free  state  he  had  labored  in  the 
Senate,  and  in  Alaska,  which  he  had  made  a 
part  of  our  country.  He  might  have  looked  for 
a  friendly  reception  from  the  republican  presi 
dent  of  Mexico,  who  was  largely  indebted  to 
him  as  secretary  of  state ;  but  he  could  hardly 
have  thought  that  from  the  day  of  his  arrival 
until  the  day  of  his  departure  from  that  coun 
try  he  was  to  be,  at  every  stage  of  his  journey 
and  at  every  resting  place,  not  merely  the  gov 
ernment's,  but  the  people's  guest.  There  was 
apparently  no  hamlet  so  small  that  his  name 
and  fame  had  not  preceded  him  there.  Not  the 
least  grateful  token  of  recognition  that  he  re 
ceived  was  in  a  village  of  cane  huts,  where  the 
tall,  swarthy  headman  handed  into  the  carriage, 
with  a  profound  bow,  a  scroll  on  which  was  writ 
ten,  "  To  the  great  statesman  of  the  great  Re 
public  of  the  North.  Techaluta  is  poor,  but  she 
is  not  ungrateful." 

In  the  East  he  was  everywhere  received  with 
the  highest  honors.  The  Mikado  of  Japan  un 
veiled  his  face  to  him  in  a  friendly  audience,  an 
honor  said  to  have  been  never  before  bestowed 
on  a  foreigner  ;  he  also  desired  his  ministers  to 
converse  with  him  on  affairs  of  state,  and  it 
must  have  been  gratifying  to  Seward  to  have 


436  WILLIAM  HENRY  SEWARD. 

been  asked  by  them  to  observe  that,  in  dealing 
with  the  vanquished  party  in  a  late  rebellion, 
"the  government  of  Japan  had  copied  the  ex 
ample  of  toleration  given  them  by  the  United 
States." 

Throughout  the  entire  East  his  reception  was 
the  same.  His  reputation  had  everywhere  pre 
ceded  him.  The  prince-regent  of  China  rose 
from  a  sick-bed  to  visit  him.  The  ministers  of 
the  various  countries  were  eager  to  see  and  to 
talk  with  the  distinguished  statesman  of  the 
West,  of  whom  they  had  heard  so  much ;  the 
European  governors  and  native  princes  of  India 
vied  with  each  other  in  their  attentions  to  him. 

Seward's  observation  was  quick  and  his  per 
ceptions  acute,  and  he  returned  home  witli  his 
mind  stored  with  the  results  and  experience  of 
travel,  and  with  new  and  healthful  interests  and 
occupations  for  the  remainder  of  his  days.  In 
spite  of  his  great  sorrows  and  of  his  increas 
ing  infirmities,  his  last  years  were  happy  ones. 
Even  in  the  busiest  period  of  his  life  his  own 
hearthstone  had  been  always  the  place  dearest 
to  him,  and  now  the  companionship  and  affec 
tion  of  his  children  and  grandchildren  and  the 
society  of  his  lifelong  friends  and  neighbors 
were  the  solace  and  enjoyment  of  his  serene 
old  age. 


INDEX. 


ADAMS,  Charles  Francis,  Free  Soil 
candidate  for  vice-president,  54  ; 
minister  to  England,  288,  298, 301 ; 
argues  with  Lord  Russell  on  rec 
ognition  of  belligerency,  303,  304  ; 
announces  end  of  foreign  hostility, 
355  ;  informs  Lord  Russell  of  pur 
pose  of  the  Alabama,  377  ;  and  of 
the  Alexandra,  379 ;  negotiates 
with  him  regarding  enlistment 
laws,  381  ;  makes  claim  for 
damage  done  by  Confederate 
cruisers,  383 ;  his  opinion  of  Eng 
lish  view  of  this  damage,  384  ;  re 
signs,  427. 

Adams,  John  Quiucy,  friend  of 
Seward,  14 ;  as  anti-Mason,  14, 
1C ;  versus  Jackson  in  1828,  19. 

Alabama,  the,  leaves  port,  377 ; 
England's  virtual  breach  of  neu 
trality,  378,  379;  depredations 
and  destruction  of,  379;  claims, 
427. 

Alaska,  purchase  of,  428. 

Albany  Regency,  the,  9. 

Alexandra,  the,  379  ;  questions  pro 
voked  as  to  enlistment  laws,  380, 
381. 

Anderson,  Major  Robert,  command 
ant  of  Fort  Suinter,  223,  252,  254, 
25Q,  2G9. 

Andrew,  John  A.,  governor  of 
Massachusetts,  his  opinion  of 
Seward,  212. 

Anti-Masons,  the,  political  activity 
of,  12-17  ;  origin  and  extinction 
of,  15. 

Arkansas,  right  of  representation 
denied  under  Reconstruction  Act, 
401,  403. 

Atchison,  David  R.,  senator  from 
Missouri,  163,  1G5,  1GG,  1G7,  175. 

Banks,  General  N.  P.,  in  command 
at  New  Orleans,  373. 


Bates,  Edward,  attorney  -  general, 
232,  250;  his  action  in  the  re 
lief  of  Sumter  and  Pickens,  254, 
255. 

Beauregard,  General  P.  G.  T.,  in 
command  at  Charleston,  266,  267, 
269. 

Bell,  John,  198  ;  opposes  Lecompton 
Constitution,  209. 

Birney,  James  G.,  49,  51. 

Blair,  Montgomery,  his  allegation 
against  Seward  re  Dixon,  131, 137, 
138,  139 ;  suggested  for  the  cabi 
net,  232,  233;  objections  against 
him,  246,  247  ;  is  chosen,  however, 
250  ;  his  action  in  the  relief  of 
Sumter  and  Pickens,  253,  255,  271. 

Brooks,  Preston  S.,  his  assault  ou 
Sunnier,  175,  176. 

Buchanan,  James,  120  ;  nominated 
for  the  presidency,  158 ;  disposi 
tion  of  votes  at  his  election,  160 ; 
represents  slave-holders,  1 61 ;  in 
augurated,  181  ;  deposes  Stanton, 
190;  defends  his  course  as  to 
Kansas,  190  ;  calls  Kansas  a  slave 
state,  193 ;  said  to  have  conferred 
with  Taney  prior  to  inaugural  ad 
dress,  194,  195  ;  his  cabinet,  223, 
224 ;  influenced  by  the  South, 
224  ;  and  by  the  attorney-general, 
225,  226  ;  no  pretext  for  the  seiz 
ure  of  Washington  during  his  ad 
ministration,  228  ;  his  message  to 
ministers  abroad  as  to  secession, 
285  ;  further  instructions  to  them, 
286. 

Bunch,  British  consul  at  Charles 
ton,  negotiates  with  Jefferson 
Davis  regarding  Treaty  of  Paris, 
315,  316. 

Butler,  General  B.  F.,  declares 
slaves  to  be  contraband  of  war, 
363  ;  treats  foreigners  arbitrarily, 
373. 


438 


INDEX. 


Calhoun,  John  C.,  and  the  anti- 
Masons,  16,  17  ;  negotiates  for  the 
annexation  of  Texas,  49  ;  his  view 
of  slavery,  63  ;  opposes  Clay  on 
territorial  government  and  slav 
ery  questions,  82  ;  how  he  regards 
compromise,  96;  his  doctrine  of 
property  of  States  in  tiie  territo 
ries,  184. 

California,  need  of  government  for, 
63,  64  ;  tentative  government,  64  ; 
Southern  designs  respecting,  66, 
67,  69 ;  asked  to  seek  admission 
to  the  Union,  67  ;  admission  dis 
cussed    at    Washington,    88,    89. 
(See,  also,  under  "  territories.") 
Cameron,     Simon,    217,    218,   232 ; 
member  of  Lincoln's  cabinet,  250 ;' 
opposed  to  relief  of  Sumter,  254. 
Campbell,  John  A.,   Judge  of  Su 
preme  Court,   agent  at  Washing 
ton  for  the  Rebel  commissioners, 
259 ;    his  policy  and  plans,  260, 
261.  262;  reports  coming  evacua 
tion   of   Sumter,   263;    writes  to 
Jefferson    Davis    about    it,    264; 
misrepresents     Seward's      state 
ment,  265  ;  declares  himself  well 
informed,  267,  268  ;  gets  Seward's 
answer  re    Sumter,   270;    writes 
to  Seward,  272  ;  foresees  decision 
as    to    Sumter,    273 ;    writes    to 
Seward  again,   274  ;  comment  on 
these  transactions,  275. 
Canadian  rebellion,  28. 
Caroline,  affair  of  the,  28-38. 
Cass,   General   Lewis,   nominee    of 
the  Democrats,  54,   55,  56  ;    on 
slavery  in   a  territory,   66  ;  loses  ! 
nomination    for    the  presidency, 
119. 
Charleston  harbor,   stone  blockade 

of,  371,372. 

Chase,  Salmon  P.,  126  ;  stated  to  be 
presidential  candidate,  154  ;  with 
draws,  155  ;  in  the  field  again, 
210,  217  ;  talked  of  for  the  cabi 
net,  232  ;  member  of  it,  250  ;  ac 
tion  in  the  relief  of  Sumter  and 
Pickens,  253,  255,  271  ;  his  opin 
ion  of  Lincoln's  policy,  279  ;  gives 
him  advice,  281  ;  his  view  of  the 
Trent  affair,  331,  332  ;  resignation 
from  office  refused,  362,  363. 
Clay,  Henry,  defeated  as  presiden 
tial  nominee,  14,  15  ;  candidacy 
in  1844,  48 ;  how  he  viewed  an 
nexation  of  Texas,  49,  50,  51,  52 ; 


nominated,  52  ;  hostile  to  Taylor, 
75,  76  ;  offers  Compromise  Reso 
lutions,  80-82;  secures  Web 
ster's  approval,  82;  admired  as 
an  orator,  86,  87  ;  his  opinion  of 
Seward's  abolition  speech,  87; 
his  views  on  compromise,  96 ;  the 
Compromise  Resolutions,  97,  98  • 
the  Omnibus  Bill,  97  ;  its  fate,  98  ; 
carriage  of  compromise  measures, 
99  ;  insists  on  holding  to  them, 

Clinton,  De  Witt,  governor  of  New 
York,  nominates  Seward  for  sur 
rogate  of  Cayuga  County,  6,  7  ; 
father  of  the  Erie  Canal  scheme, 

Confederate  cruisers,  built  and 
equipped  in  England,  376  ;  their 
sailing  at  first  not  prevented,  379 ; 
then  often  stopped,  382;  Eng 
land's  liability  for  their  depreda 
tions,  383  ;  indemnity  paid,  384 ; 
their  harm  to  trade,  384,  385; 
their  reception  in  foreign  ports, 
385. 

Confederate  successes  in  1862,  352, 
353;  checked,  353;  consequences 
on  British  opinion,  353. 

Corwin,  Thomas,  a  leading  Com 
promiser,  99. 

Cowley,  Lord,  British  envoy  to 
France,  305,  307. 

Crittenden,  John  J.,  191 ;  opposes 
Lecompton  Constitution,  198  ; 
brings  forward  constitutional 
amendments,  233  ;  which  are  not 
accepted,  234,  236. 

Cuba  Bill,  the,  202,  203. 

Curtis,  Judge  B.  R.,  on  the  Dred 
Scott  case,  184,  185. 

Dallas,  George  K,  U.  S.  minister 
to  England,  302,  305,  307. 

Davis,  Henry  Winter,  attacks 
Lincoln  in  connection  with  Re 
construction,  403. 

Davis,  Jefferson,  declares  slavery 
sanctioned  by  the  Bible,  93 ;  loses 
election  for  governor  of  Missis 
sippi,  111  ;  helps  to  upset  the 
Missouri  Compromise,  125  ;  offers 
pro-slavery  resolutions  in  the 
Senate,  204;  his  intrigues  inter 
fered  with,  226 ;  proposes  an 
amendment  to  the  Constitution, 
236  ;  tries  to  get  the  Confederacy 
recognized  abroad,  298;  issues 


INDEX. 


439 


letters  of  marque,  306,  312  ;  ne 
gotiates  with  Bunch  regarding 
Treaty  of  Paris,  315  ;  sends  Mason 
and  Slidell  to  Europe,  321. 

Denver,  John  W.,  governor  of  Kan 
sas,  193. 

District  of  Columbia,  questions  as 
to  slavery  there,  81,  88,  90,  103, 
234. 

Dix,  General  John  A.,  pronounces 
on  Lincoln's  want  of  policy.  279. 

Dixon,  Archibald,  his  connection 
with  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise,  131,  135,  139. 

Dodge,  Henry,  senator  from  Wis 
consin,  introduces  bill  for  organi 
zation  of  Nebraska,  132. 

Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  124;  helps  to 
upset  Missouri  Compromise,  125, 
120,  127  ;  the  Nebraska  Bill,  133, 
134,  130,  137  ;  object  of  his  de 
nunciation  of  the  Know-nothings, 
148;  his  report  on  Kansas 
troubles,  170  ;  addresses  the  Sen 
ate  on  the  subject,  171 ;  de 
nounces  admission  of  Kansas, 
192  ;  his  power,  192  ;  sides  with 
Republicans  on  Kansas  question, 
196;  debates  with  Lincoln,  201; 
nominated  for  presidency,  209. 

Dred  Scott  case,  the,  judgment  of 
Supreme  Court,  181,  182,  183, 
194 ;  opinion  of  the  dissenting 
judges,  182,  183,  184  ;  additional 
pronouncement  of  the  chief  jus 
tice,  183,  184,  195;  opinions  of 
Curtis,  Lincoln,  Seward,  185;  de 
cision  claimed  to  allow  slavery  in 
all  states,  221. 

Emancipation,  questions  relating 
to,  3-jS.  3G3,  3G4 ;  Lincoln  on  the 
subject,  365  ;  and  Seward,  366 ; 
proclamation  postponed,  366  ;  de 
clared,  366,  367. 

Emigrant  Aid  Societies,  their  action 
in  Kansas,  164,  170,  171. 

England,  good  feeling  there  towards 
the  Union,  293;  probable  effect 
of  war  on  her  industries,  294,  296, 
297  :  hostility  towards  the  North, 
297  ;  proposal  of  concerted  action 
with  France,  299,  300;  negotia 
tions  with  U.  S.  concerning  Treaty 
of  Paris,  312,  313;  her  attitude 
towards  privateering,  314-317 ; 
prepares  for  war  in  consequence 
of  the  Trent  affair,  322,  323 ;  how 


insulted,  323 ;  refuses  to  retract 
recognition  of  belligerency,  352 ; 
abandons  mediation,  353  ;  treaty 
with  U.  S.  for  extirpation  of  slave 
trade,  355 ;  supplies  the  rebels, 
375  ;  her  violations  of  neutrality, 
375,  376  ;  more  active  in  stopping 
Confederate  cruisers  from  sailing, 
382  ;  her  liability  for  damage  done 
by  them,  383,  384 ;  in  the  alliance 
against  Mexico,  388;  withdraws 
from  it,  389. 

Enlistment  laws,  380,  381. 

Erie  Canal,  Seward  against  its  con 
struction,  8  ;  enlarged  by  him,  23. 

Erie  Railway,  opening  of,  110. 

Everett,  Edward,  16,  209. 

European  opinion  as  to  the  war,  292, 
296,  320. 

Fessenden,  William  P.,  126;  on 
Mormon  question,  200. 

Fillmore,  Millard,  nominated  for 
the  vice-presidency,  54 ;  succeeds 
Taylor,  99  ;  position  with  regard 
to  Seward  and  Compromise,  101, 
102 ;  Compromise  candidate  in 
1853,  120 ;  defeated  for  the  presi 
dency,  160. 

Fish,  Hamilton,  elected  to  the  Sen 
ate,  107. 

Florida,  the,  376,  377. 

Foote,  Henry  S.,  governor  of  Missis 
sippi,  111,  126. 

Forsyth,  John,  secretary  of  state, 
29. 

Fort  Pickens,  223 ;  the  relief  expe 
dition,  252,  255,  256,  270,  271, 
273;  success  of  the  expedition, 
257. 

Fort  Sumter,  223,  225  ;  completely 
blockaded,  252  ;  relief  considered, 
252-254,  255;  failure  of  relief 
expedition,  256;  historical  im 
portance  of  first  shot  fired  there, 
257  ;  reported  evacuation,  262, 
263,  266,  267. 

Fox,  Captain  G.  V.,  assistant  secre 
tary  of  the  navy,  251  ;  his  part 
in  the  relief  of  Sumter,  254,  255, 
256  :  his  opinion  of  the  value  of 
St.  Thomas  to  the  U.  S.,  430. 

Fox,  Henry  Stephen,  British  minis 
ter  at  Washington,  his  action  in 
the  Caroline  affair,  30,  31. 

France,  favors  maintenance  of  the 
Union,  293 ;  probable  effect  of 
war  on  her  industries,  294,  296, 


440 


INDEX. 


297  ;  proposal  of  concerted  action 
with  England,  299,  300,  304  ;  ne 
gotiations  with  U.  S.  as  to  Treaty 
of  Paris,  313;  her  intended  ac 
tion  in  the  Trent  case,  350,  351  ; 
refuses  to  retract  recognition  of 
belligerency,  352  ;  proposes  medi 
ation,  353,  354  ;  in  the  alliance 
against  Mexico,  388;  her  aims 
there,  389 ;  warlike  sentiment 
against  U.  S.,  393 ;  withdraws 
from  Mexico,  394. 

Freeman,  negro  murderer,  45 ;  de 
fended  by  Seward,  4G  ;  convicted 
though  proved  insane,  4G ;  dies 
naturally,  47. 

Fremont,  John  C.,  California  can 
didate  for  the  presidency,  154, 

.  155  ;  personal  qualities  and  popu 
larity  as  candidate,  157,  158; 
numerical  details  of  his  defeat, 
1GO. 

Free  Soilers,  the,  declaration  of 
policy,  55  ;  their  position  at  the 
beginning  of  Taylor's  administra 
tion,  70 ;  merged  into  the  Repub 
lican  party,  143  ;  opposed  to  Sew 
ard,  216. 

Fugitive  Slave  Law,  104,  105 ;  ob 
jected  to  by  the  North,  105,  10G ; 
partly  inoperative,  107 ;  growing 
sentiment  against  it,  108  ;  petitions 
for  its  repeal,  109  ;  decreased 
excitement  about  it,  112 ;  pro 
posed  amendment,  234. 

Geary,  John  W.,  governor  of  Kan 
sas,  1G8,  169,  186. 

Gilmer,  Thomas  W.,  governor  of 
Virginia,  40,  41. 

Grant,  General  U.  S.,  believes  in 
short  duration  of  the  war,  244. 

Greeley,  Horace,  seeks  nomination 
for  governor  of  New  York,  150 ; 
attributes  his  defeat  to  Seward, 
150 ;  plans  retaliation,  151  ;  for 
which  Seward's  nomination  gives 
him  opportunity,  213-216. 

Harrison,   William  Henry,  16,   32; 

his  opinion  of  Seward,  37. 
Hayti,  diplomatic  relations  opened 

with  U.  S.,  355. 
Homestead  Bill,  the,  203. 
Hughes,       Archbishop,      unofficial 

agent  of  U.  S.  in  Europe,  350. 

Jackson,  Andrew,  defeats  the  Na 


tional  Republican  party,  11  ;  re- 
elected  president,  15  ;  attacks  the 
U.  S.  Bank,  15,  20  ;  Seward's  op 
position  to  him,  17  ;  in  the  cam 
paign  of  1828,  17,  19 ;  his  strength 
and  policy  in  1832,  19,  20. 

Jennings,  maiden  name  of  Seward's 
mother,  2. 

John  Brown  Raid,  the,  203. 

Johnson,  Andrew,  on  punishment 
of  treason,  407 ;  believes  rebel 
states  belong  inalienably  to  the 
Union,  408,  409  ;  issues  proclama 
tion  of  cessation  of  hostilities,  and 
of  amnesty,  409 ;  criticism  of  his 
additional  clauses  to  the  latter, 
409,  410,  411  ;  appoints  governors 
for  some  of  the  rebel  states,  411  ; 
takes  steps  as  to  franchise,  hold 
ing  office,  slavery,  war  debts  in 
rebel  states,  412,  413  ;  constitu 
tionality  of  his  measures  discussed, 
413,  414  ;  his  Reconstruction  pol 
icy  attributed  to  Seward,  415 ; 
the  statement  examined,  415,  416, 
423 ;  his  personality  and  char 
acter,  416,  417  ;  snubbed  by  his 
party,  417  ;  fights  congressional 
plan  of  Reconstruction,  418,  419, 
420,  421  ;  counter  attacks  result 
in  his  impeachment,  419  ;  loses 
popular  confidence,  420. 

Johnson-Clarendon  Treaty,  427. 

Kansas,  question  as  to  legality  of 
slavery  there,  124  ;  formation  of 
Nebraska,  125;  future  of  the 
South  dependent  on  the  fate  of, 
1G3  ;  invaded  by  Missourians,  164  ; 
who  carry  elections  by  fraud  and 
force,  165,  166;  and  continue 
their  rule  of  terror,  167  ;  seeks 
admission  as  a  free  state,  187; 
legislature  dispersed,  168 ;  fur 
ther  scenes  of  violence,  168  ; 
speech  by  Seward  on,  172,  174  ; 
further  propositions  at  Washing 
ton  for  administration  of  this 
state,  177 ;  whose  wrongs  are 
conclusively  proved,  179  ;  petition 
for  admission  rejected  by  the 
Senate,  180  ;  admitted  as  a  free 
state,  199.  (See,  also,  under  "  Ter 
ritories.") 

Kearsarge,  the,  sinks  the  Alabama, 
379. 

King,  T.  Butler,  Taylor's  emissary 
to  California,  67,  68. 


INDEX. 


441 


Know-nothings,  the,  their  purpose, 
146,  147  ;  figure  as  a  Unionist 
party,  147  ;  their  power,  148  ; 
antagonistic  to  Sevvard,  216. 

Kossuth,  Louis,  and  the  Hungarian 
question,  112 ;  in  England,  113  ; 
conies  to  America,  114. 

Lafayette,  Marquis  de,  at  Auburn  in 
1825,  7. 

Lamon,  Marshal,  sent  to  Charleston, 
269. 

Lawrence,  town  of  Kansas,  raids 
there,  165,  167,  177. 

Lecompton  Constitution,  188,  190, 
192,  193,  196,  198,  199. 

Liberia,  diplomatic  relations  opened 
withU.  S.,355. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  with  Seward  at 
Boston,  56 ;   on  the    Dred  Scott 
case,  185  ;  debates  with  Douglas, 
201  ;  nominee  for  the  presidency, 
210  ;  his  career  till  then,  210,  211 ; 
particulars  of  his  nomination,  218; 
how  his  election  was  made  certain,  I 
220  ;   in   danger  at  Washington,  | 
228 ;    confers  with    Weed   about  j 


slavery  and  its  consequence,  122  •, 
denied  the  right  of  representation 
under  the  Reconstruction  Act, 
402,  403. 

Lyons,  Lord,  British  minister  to 
the  U.  S.,  241,  305,  307  ;  avoids 
Seward  after  the  Trent  affair, 
328;  gives  him  Lord  Russell's  des 
patch,  338;  concerning  blockade 
of  Charleston,  371,  372. 

Marshall,  Chief  Justice,  an  anti- 
Mason,  14,  16. 

Mason,  James  M. ,  93,  200,  226  ; 
Southern  envoy  to  England,  321  ; 
captured  on  board  the  Trent,  322  ; 
surrendered,  345. 

Mathew,  Father,  78. 

Maximilian,  Arch-Duke  of  Austria, 
Emperor  of  Mexico,  390;  exe 
cuted,  394. 

McClellan,  General  G.  B.,  advises 
Seward  on  the  Trent  affair,  327. 

Mcllvaine,  Bishop,  unofficial  agent 
of  the  U.  S.  in  Europe,  350. 

McLean,  John,  candidate  for  presi 
dential  nomination,  155. 


make-up  of  a  cabinet,  231,  233  ;  ;  McLeod,  Alexander,  and  the  Caro- 


expected  to  check  spread  of 
cession,  244,  245  ;  forms  his  cabi 
net,  24(j,  247  ;  comments  on  Sew 
ard 's  withdrawal,  248 ;  persuades 
Seward  to  join  the  cabinet,  250 ; 
its  composition,  249,  250  ;  gravity 
of  problems  to  be  faced,  251,  252  ; 
considers  relief  of  Sumter  and 
Pickens,  253-255,  268,  269  ;  de 
cides  on  Sumier  expedition,  271 ; 
orders  it,  272  ;  his  want  of  a  pol 
icy,  279  ;  answers  Seward's  mem 
orandum,  "  Some  Thoughts,"  etc., 
280  ;  suspends  Habeas  Corpus, 
317  ;  supposed  views  on  and  ac 
tion  in  the  Trent  affair,  332-386 ; 
refuses  resignation  of  Seward  and 
Chase,  362,  363  ;  on  emancipation, 
365  ;  believes  in  separate  treat 
ment  of  rebel  states,  398,  399; 
his  message  to  that  effect,  and 
amnesty  proclamation,  399 ;  which 
are  disliked  by  Congress,  400; 
disapproves  of  congressional  idea 
of  reconstruction,  402,  403 ;  com 
ment  on  his  own  idea  of  it,  404, 
406. 


line  affair,  30-38. 

Mercier,  French  minister  to  U.  S., 
348. 

Mexico,  alliance  against,  338 ;  French 
plans  there,  389  ;  monarchy  estab 
lished  in,  390 ;  which  is  not  recog 
nized  by  U.  S.,  392  ;  war  between 
France  and  U.  S.  averted,  393. 
(See,  also,  under  "Territories.") 

Miller,  Elijah,  Seward's  father-in- 
law,  5. 

Miller,  Frances,  married  to  Seward, 
5. 

Missouri  Compromise,  fathered  by 
Clay,  80  ;  particulars  of,  103,  104  ; 
its  meaning,  122,  123;  area  of 
slavery  increased  by  it,  123 ;  va 
lidity  as  to  Kansas  disputed,  124  ; 
repealed  by  the  Senate,  125  ;  final 
passage  of  repeal,  139,  140 ;  its 
constitutionality  questioned,  193 ; 
proposition  for  its  restoration  and 
extension,  234. 

Morgan,  William,  his  alleged  expos 
ure  of  Masonic  secrets  and  con 
sequent  murder,  12. 

Mormons,  the,  199,  200,  201. 


Lossing,  B.    J.,  historian,   on  Lin-  |  Motley,  John  Lothrop,  historian,  his 
coin  and  the  Trent  affair,  333.         ,      opinion  of  British  recognition  of 
Louisiana,  purchase  of,  extension  of  |      belligerency,  309. 


442 


INDEX. 


Nebraska,  how  organized,  125,  132. 
(See,  also,  under  "  Territories.") 

Nelson,  Samuel,  Judge  of  Supreme 
Court,  calls  on  Seward,  260 ;  his 
policy,  261  ;  no  endorsement  from 
him  of  Campbell's  charges  against 
Seward,  2G6 ;  severs  his  connec 
tion  with  Campbell,  2G7. 

New  York  Senate,  constitution  of, 
17,  19. 

Nott,  Eliphalet,  president  of  Union 
College,  3. 

Omnibus  Bill,  97,  98,  99. 
Osawotomie,  town  of  Kansas,  burnt, 
1C7. 

Palmerston,  Henry  John  Temple, 
Viscount,  attitude  of  in  the  Caro 
line  affair,  31,  32  ;  corresponds 
with  Russell  on  mediation,  348, 
349,  353. 

Pickeus,  Governor  Francis  W.,  asks 
for  information  respecting  Sum- 
ter,  2G9 ;  gets  message  from  Lin 
coln,  272. 

Pierce,  Franklin,  nominated  for  the 
presidency,  120 ;  elected,  121  ; 
first  message,  122  ;  persuaded  to 
repeal  of  Missouri  Compromise, 
125 ;  breaks  up  Kansas  legislature, 
1 G8  ;  tries  to  make  Kansas  a  slave 
state,  1G9  ;  arraigned  for  this  by 
Seward,  172,  173. 

Pocahontas,  the,  256. 

Polk,  James  K.,  nominated  for  the 
presidency,  49  ;  makes  war  upon 
Mexico,  G2 ;  recommends  regular 
government  for  Mexico  and  Cali 
fornia,  G3,  G8. 

Porter,  Admiral  David,  his  opinion 
of  the  value  of  St.  Thomas  to  the 
U.  S.,  430. 

Powhatan,  the,  256,  257. 

Public  service,  the,  condition  of  in 
1861,  281-285. 

Raymond,  Henry  J.,  lieutenant-gov-  j 
ernor  of  New  York,  150,  213,  214. 

Rebel  commissioners  to  Washington, 
refused    recognition,   258 ;    claim 
diplomatic    rank,   259  ;   their  in-  j 
etructions  to  Campbell,  203  ;  their  ! 
own  course,  2G4  ;  leave  Washing 
ton,  273. 

Reconstruction,  provisions  of  first 
act,  401,  402  ;  respective  positions 
of  Congress  and  President  in  the 


matter,  403,  404  ;  constitutionality 
of  the  act  considered,  413,  414  ; 
the  plan  as  finally  carried  out, 
421,  422. 

Reeder,  Andrew  H.,  governor  of 
Kansas,  1G4,  1G5,  1G9  ;  as  territo 
rial  delegate,  171. 

Republican  party,  the,  formation  of, 
85,  143,  153 ;  its  improved  posi 
tion,  191. 

Riley,  General  Bennett,  his  part  in 
the  formation  of  government  in 
California,  G4,  G5,  68. 
Rinaldo,  the,  345. 
Rush,  Richard,  in  the  anti-Mason 

party,  16. 

Russell,  Lord  John,  English  secre 
tary  of  state  for  foreign  affairs, 
!41  ;  on  blockade  of  Southern 
ports,  291  ;  delays  giving  opinion 
on  belligerency,  299, 302  ;  declares 
neutrality  of  England,  300,  302; 
this  act  shown  to  be  unfriendly 
303,  304  ;  and  also  premature,  304- 
307  ;  interviews  Southern  com 
missioners,  307  ;  probable  motives 
in  recognizing  Confederacy,  308  ; 
criticises  suspension  of  Habeas 
Corpus,  317  ;  notes  to  Lord  Lyons 
on  Trent  affair,  329, 330  ;  his  ori 
ginal  contention  in  the  matter, 
34G  ;  corresponds  with  Lord  Pal 
merston  as  to  mediation,  348,  349,, 
353  ;  protests  against  stone  block 
ade,  371  ;  action  with  regard  to 
enlistment  laws,  381 ;  testifies  to 
Seward's  ability,  395. 
Russia,  invited  to  join  England  and 
France  regarding  Confederacy, 
289l 

San  Jacinto,  the,  boards  the  Trent, 

Scott,  Sir  Wilh'am,  his  doctrine  of 
contraband  of  war  applied  to  the 
Trent  case,  341,  342. 

Scott,  General  Winfield,  120,  121, 
252,  253. 

Seward,  John,  1. 

Seward,  Dr.  Samuel  S.,  1,  7. 

Seward,  Mrs.  Samuel  S.  (nee  Jen 
nings),  2 ;  death  of,  397. 

Seward,  William  Henry,  family  con 
nections,  1,  2  ;  school  days,  2;  at 
Union  College,  2, 3;  teaches  school 
in  Georgia,  4  ;  returns  to  Goshen 
and  studies  law,  4  ;  admitted  to 
the  bar  at  Utica,  5  ;  established  at 


INDEX. 


443 


Auburn,   5;  marries,   5;  first  ap 
pearance  and  success  in  court,  6  ; 
conscientious  in  professional  de 
tails,  G ;  nominated  for  surrogate 
of  Cayuga  County,  7  ;  and  for  sec-  j 
retary  of  state,  7  ;  as  a  militiaman,  j 
7;     sides    with     Tammany,     but 
eventually    supports   Clinton,  8 ; 
meets  Weed,  9  ;  attacks  the  Al 
bany  Regency,  9  ;  enunciation  of 
his  political  views  in  1825,  10,  11 ; 
works  for  reelection  of  John  Quin- 
cy  Adams,  11 ;  joins  anti-Masons, 
12 ;  visits  John  Quincy  Adams,  14  ; 
speaks    from    anti-Masonic    plat 
forms,  14  ;  reasons  for  joining  the 
anti-Masons,  17  ;  elected  by  them 
to  the  New  York  Senate,  17  ;  phy 
sical  disadvantages  and   want   of 
experience,  17,  18  ;  makes  maiden 
speech   on   military   reform,    18 ; 
further  activity  as  senator,  18, 19  ; 
visits  Europe,   19 ;    defeated  for 
governor  and  resumes  legal  prac 
tice,   21; -dealings  with  the  Hol 
land  Company,   21,    22;    elected 
governor  of  New  York,   22  ;  ex 
tends  public  works,  23  ;  and  inter 
nal  communications,   24;   efforts 
in  the  cause  of  popular  education, 
25,  26  ;  and  in  the  simplification 
of  legal  procedure,  2G  ;  his  human- 
itarianism  while  in  office,  26 ;  how 
he  regarded  the  spoils  system,  27, 
28  ;    good-tempered  towards  the  i 
opposition,  28 ;  affair  of  the  Caro-  j 
line,  28  et  seq.  ;  complains  of  un-  ' 
just  treatment,  35,   36 ;  Virginia 
controversy,  38-41 ;     opinions   of  , 
Adams    and   of    the    Democrats  i 
thereupon,  40,  41 ;  his  message  in 
answer,  42  ;  retires,  43  ;  aspersions 
upon  his  official  career,   43;  be 
lieves  to  have  done  with   public 
life,  44 ;  and  resumes  local  prac- 
tjC6i  44  ;    characteristic   behavior  ; 
in  the  defense  of  Freeman,  45,  4G  ;  j 
popular  "opinion1  Of  ttr,  47  ;  declines  i 
repeated  offers  of  nomination,  47  ;  I 
speaks  in  support  of    Clay,   48; 
his  arguments  against  annexation 
of  Tejas  and  against  slavery,  50, 
•STTcontinues    ttts    agitation   in 
spite  of  Clay's  change   of  front, 
52 ;  relations  with  the  Whigs,  52, 
53;  declines  to  reenter  politics, 
53 ;  opinion  of  Taylor's  nomina 
tion    and  of  Fillmore's,  53  ;  sug 


gested  for  vice-president,  54  ;  po 
sition    and    activity    in    Taylor's 
election  campaign,  55,  56  ;  senti 
ments  on  slavery  question  and  in 
terpretation  of  Whig  policy,   56- 
60 ;  earnestness  as  a  speaker,  60 ; 
returns  to  his  profession  after  this 
campaign,    60 ;     elected    senator 
from  New  York,  61  ;  wishes  legal 
government  for  the  territories,  67 ; 
declares  Taylor's  intentions  as  to 
slavery  in  the  territories,  77  ;  an 
swers  personal    attacks,   79,   86; 
marks  an  epoch  by  his  abolition 
speech,  87,  88  ;  general  sketch  of 
this    speech,    88-90 ;    arguments 
therein  on  constitutional  author 
ity  over  the  national  domain,  91 ; 
and  over  the  prohibition  of  slav 
ery,  91,  92;  and  on  the  preserva 
tion  of  the  Union,  94,  95;  com 
ment  on  these  arguments,  92,  93, 
94,  95  ;  to  what  extent  willing  to 
compromise,  96,  97  ;  relations  with 
Fillmore,   101 ;    whose    accession 
does  not  change  his  compromise 
policy,  102;  agitates  against  Fugi 
tive  Slave  Law,  109,  110  ;  as  a  re 
former  of  postal  service,  110  ;  at 
the  lake  opening  of  the  Erie  Rail 
way,  110  ;  moves  a  protest  against 
Russian  interference  in  Hungary, 
115,  116 ;  his  justification  of  such 
a  protest,  117  ;  this  resolution  de 
feated,    118  ;    on    the    commerce 
committee,  119  ;    discouraged  at 
weakness  of  the  North,  120  ;  does 
not  sign  address  of  Independent 
Democrats,     126 ;      first_^speech 
against  repeal _o.i._Migi"vir1  f!"m- 
promisej      128-130 ;      despondent 
about  it,  130  ;  accused  of  originat 
ing    repeal,    131 ;    this   case   dis 
cussed,   132-139  ;    segond   speech 
on  repeal  of  Missouri  Compromise,  - 
110,  141  ;  his  importance  in  the  or 
ganization  of  a  neAv  national  party, 
145  ;  wishes  to  hold  back  informa 
tion,    146 ;  takes  no  part   in  the 
Know-nothing  campaign,  148  ;  re- 
elected  senator,  149  ;  this  election 
damaging  to  the  Know-nothings, 
149;  Greeley's  hostility  to  him,150; 
speaks  at  Albany  for  the  forma 
tion  of  the  new  party,  151 ;  presi 
dential  aspirations,  153,  154 ;  de 
clines  nomination,  155  ;  could  not 
have  carried  the  convention,  156 ; 


444 


INDEX. 


his  opinion  of  Buchanan's  nomi 
nation,  158  ;  Detroit  and  Auburn 
speeches,  159  ;  proposes  admission 
of  Kansas,  171  ;  comment  on  this 
speech,  173,  174  ;  on  effects  of  the 
assault,  on  Sunnier,  17C ;  again 
champions  the  cause  of  Kansas, 
178  ;  on  the  Dred  Scott  case,  185, 
18G  ;  grows  in  prestige,  and  so  does 
Republican  party,  191  ;  on  the 
policy  and  power  of  Douglas,  192  ; 
further  declarations  in  support  of 
Kansas,  192,  193 ;  makes  charges 
against  Taney  and  Buchanan,  194  ; 
speech  on  Lecompton.  .Coustitu.- 
tioii,  197,  198  ;  indicts  Democratic 
party  at  Rochester,  201,  202  ;  .urges 
adoption  of  Homestead  Bill  in  lieu 
of  Cuba  Bill,  203  ;  trip  to  Europe, 
203  ;  speech  on  Wyandqt  Constitu 
tion,  205,  20S  ;  thought  fo'be  sure 
of  nomination  for  the  presidency, 
210  ;  mainstay  of  the  Republican 
party,  211  ;  how  estimated  at  the 
South,  211, 212  ;  and  by  his  friends, 
212  ;  failure  to  obtain  nomination 
due  partly  to  Greeley,  213-21G; 
and  partly  to  other  causes,  210, 
218  ;  though  defeated,  continues 
his  part  in  the  campaign,  219 ; 
said.. .to. .favor  conciliation  of  the 
South,  229,  230;  but  lias  no  defi 
nite  plan,  230,  231  ;  offered  secre 
taryship  of  state,  231  ;  which  he 
decides  to  accept,  233 ;  opposes 
Crittenden's  resolutions,  •„'.",!  : 
making  counter  propositions,  235  ; 
which  come  to  nought,  .  230, ; 
speaks  on  advantages  of  the 
Union,  238 ;  and  on  concessioos, 
239 ;  urges  admission  of  Kan 
sas,  239 ;  charges  against  him  in 
this  connection,  240;  his  M'CWS 
explained,  241-243  ;  his  meaning 
distorted,  243 ;  hopes  Lincoln's 
accession  will  prove  salutary  to 
the  Union,  244  ;  such  expectations 
mistaken,  244,  245 ;  refuses  to 
enter  Lincoln's  cabinet,  247,  248 ; 
comment  thereon,  249  ;  finally  ac 
cepts  portfolio,  250 ;  opposes  re 
lief  of  Sumter,  254  ;  criticised  as 
to  relief  of  Pickens,  256  ;  declines 
to  receive  rebel  commissioners, 
258  ;  accused  by  Campbell  of  per 
fidy,  259  ;  ignorant  of  Campbell's 
real  position,  260,  262,  266;  de 
sires  postponement  of  armed  hos 


tilities,  261 ;  tells  Campbell  Sum 
ter  will  be  evacuated,  263;  his 
statement  unguarded,  265  ;  again 
answers  Campbell  re  Sumter,  270 ; 
ignorant  of  Lincoln's  decision  re 
Sumter,  273 ;  does  not  reply  to 
letters  from  Campbell,  274 ;  no 
reason  to  suspect  his  good  faith 
in  these  dealings,  275  ;  writes 
"Some  Thoughts  for  the  Presi 
dent's  Consideration,"  276,  277; 
rashness  of  his  foreign  policy,  278  ; 
as  to  domestic  policy,  thinks  is 
sue  should  be  union  instead  of 
slavery,  280;  doubtful  propriety 
of  "Some  Thoughts,"  281;  his 
devotion  to  Lincoln,  282  ;  on  the 
condition  of  the  public  service, 
283-285  ;  circular  on  secession  to 
ministers  abroad,  286,  287  ;  selec 
tion  of  representatives  of  the  U. 
S.,  288,  289;  advocates  blockade 
of  Southern  ports,  290;  under 
stands  foreign  trade  relations,  297; 
believes  in  strong  representation 
abroad,  298;  anxious  about  for 
eign  relations,  299  ;  refuses  to  re 
ceive  British  and  French  minis 
ters  together,  300;  despatch  to 
Adams  on  recognition^?  belliger^ 
ency,'J501  ;~K6w  he regarded  the 
recognition,  308,  309 ;  opens  ne 
gotiations  concerning  Treaty  of 
Paris,  312;  from  which  he  with 
draws,  313  ;  his  opinions,  313, 314  ; 
resents  Bunch's  negotiations  with 
Jefferson  Davis,  316 ;  and  Lord 
Russell's  criticism  of  suspension 
of  Habeas  Corpus,  317  ;  alleged  to 
have  intermeddled  in  War  Depart 
ment,  318  ;  th  allegation  exam 
ined,  318, 319  ;  fears  possibility  of 
foreign  war,  320,  3'2l  ;  various  re 
ports  as  to  his  view  of  the  Trent 
affair,  325,  327;  letter  to  Adams 
on  the  Trent  affair,  327,  328; 
avoids  Lord  Lyons  at  this  time, 
328 ;  answers  Lord  Russell's  de 
spatch,  330,  331  ;  supposed  inter 
views  with  Lincoln  as  to  the  Trent 
affair,  335 ;  nature  of  despatch  in 
reply  to  Lord  Russell,  336  ;  which 
is  entirely  his  own  work,  337 ; 
justifies  detention  and  search  of 
the  Trent,  340-342;  but  admits 
irregularity  of  the  proceedings, 
343,  344 ;  merits  of  his  decision, 
344 ;  fears  European  intervention. 


INDEX. 


445 


348  ;  sends  over  unofficial  agents,  I 
350 ;  correspondence  with  minis-  | 
ters  abroad,  351  ;  protests  against 
recognition  of  belligerency,  35:2 ; 
refuses  French  otter  of  mediation, 
354,  355 ;  treats  with  England  for 
extirpation  of  slave  trade,  355  ; 
advocates  reinforcement  of  troops, 
356-359;  writes  to  Adams  about 
this,  358  ;  gives  offense  thereby, 
359;  his  removal  desired,  357, 
360,  361  ;  and  suggested,  361,  362  ; 
his  resignation  refused,  362,  363  ; 
advises  postponement  of  emanci 
pation  proclamation,  366  ;  treat 
ment  of  mails  on  blockade  -  run 
ners,  369,  370  ;  despatch  to  Adams 
on  blockade  of  Charleston,  372  ; 
correspondence  relating  to  Con 
federate  cruisers,  383  ;  declines 
to  join  alliance  against  Mexico, 
388  ;  correspondence  with  France 
regarding  form  of  government  in 
Mexico,  390-393 ;  general  remarks 
on  his  diplomacy  and  despatches 
during  the  war,  394,  395  ;  carriage 
accident  and  attempted  assas 
sination,  396  ;  death  of  his  wife 
and  daughter,  397  ;  rapid  recov 
ery,  398  ;  reported  action  in  addi 
tional  clauses  to  Johnson's  am 
nesty  proclamation,  410  ;  did  not 
inspire  Johnson's  Reconstruction 
policy,  423  ;  upholds  him  on  the 
question  of  Reconstruction,  424  ; 
speaks  at  Cooper  Union  on  the 
subject,  424;  believes  the  Union 
to  be  safe,  425;  reasons  for  re 
maining  in  the  cabinet,  425,  426  ; 
negotiates  for  construction  of  Nic 
aragua  Canal,  426  ;  naturalization 
treaties,  426;  effects  commercial 
treaty  with  Madagascar,  427  ;  pur 
chase  of  Alaska,  428 ;  wants  to 
purchase  St.  Thomas,  428  ;  is 
balked  by  the  Senate,  429;  resigns, 
430  ;  travels,  430  ;  his  death,  431  ; 
private,  professional,  political 
character,  431-434  ;  how  received 
in  Mexico  and  Japan,  435 ;  and  in 
other  Eastern  countries,  436 
his  old  age,  436. 

Shannon,  Wilson,  governor  of  Kan 
sas,  166,  168,  169. 

Shenandoah,  cruise  of  the,  382. 

Silver  Greys,  the.  103, 110,  149,  152 

Slidell,    John,  200,   226  ;    Southern 
envoy  to  France,  321  ;  capturec 


on  board  the  Trent,  322  ;  surren 
dered,  345. 

Slidell,  Miss,  statement  of  to  Brit 
ish  ministry,  323. 

Smith,  Caleb  B.,  218  ;  secretary  of 
the  interior,  250  ;  opposed  to  re 
lief  of  Surnter,  254,  271. 

South  Carolina,  threatens  to  secede, 
222 ;  sets  up  as  a  hostile  power, 
225. 

Southern  ports,  blockade  of,  288, 
291,371,  372;  mails  entering  on 
blockade-runners,  369,  370. 

Spain,  in  the  alliance  against 
Mexico,  388  ;  withdraws  from  it, 
389. 

Stauton,  Edwin  M.,  in  Buchanan's 
cabinet,  226  ;  secretary  of  war  un 
der  Lincoln,  318. 

Staiiton,  Frederic  P.,  governor  of 
Kansas,  189,  190. 

Stephens,  Alexander  H.,  on  the 
Union,  222. 

Stevens,  Thaddeus,  240  ;  his  theory 
of  reconstruction,  414. 

Story,  Judge,  as  anti-Mason,  16. 

St.  Albans,  town  of  Vermont,  raid 
on,  386,  387. 

St.  Thomas,  treaty  suggested  for  its 
purchase,  428  ;  its  value  to  U.  S., 

428,  429 ;    the     treaty    rejected, 

429,  430. 

Sumner,  Charles,  elected  to  Senate, 
107  ;  position  with  regard  to  re 
peal  of  Missouri  Compromise,  126, 
127  ;  and  Nebraska  Bill,  135  ;  de 
fends  Emigrant  Aid  Society,  171 ; 
assault  upon  him,  175  ;  political 
import  and  effects  thereof,  176, 
177  ;  his  violent  speech  on  Kan 
sas,  175  ;  votes  for  acts  organizing 
new  territories,  240 ;  on  Seward 
and  the  Trent  affair,  326 ;  on 
Lincoln  and  the  Trent  affair,  334  ; 
his  own  opinion  of  it,  342  ;  resolu 
tion  opposing  monarchical  govern 
ment  in  Mexico,  392  ;  on  the  posi 
tion  of  rebel  states  after  the  war, 
401  ;  recommends  purchase  of 
Alaska,  428. 

Tammany,  or  "  Bucktails,"  7. 
Taylor,  General  Zachary,  nominated 

for    the  presidency,   53,   55,  56 ; 

elected,   60  ;  invades  Mexico,  62  ; 

encourages   California    and   New 

Mexico  to  seek  admission,  67,  68  ; 

desires     permanent    government 


446 


with  Harrison  re  Seward,  37,  38 ; 


for  them,  67,   68 ;    not    pledged  I 

to  special  principles,  75  ;  how  resentment  towards  Taylor'  76' 
thought  of  by  Clay  and  Webster,  |  77  ;  speaks  for  preservation  of  the 
75,  7ti,  78  ;  relations  with  Seward, 


67,  77 ;  effects  of  letters  from 
Seward  considered,  77,  78 ;  char 
acter  and  opinions,  79,  80  ;  recom 
mends  admission  of  California, 
80  ;  dies,  98  ;  opposed  to  Compro 
mise,  98,  100  ;  a  staunch  Union 
ist,  100;  effect  of  his  death  on 
Seward's  position,  101. 

Taney,  Chief  Justice  Roger  B.,  gives 
political  opinion  on  slavery  in  the 
Dred  Scott  case,  183,  184  ;  said  to 
have  conferred  with  Buchanan 
about  this,  194,  195 ;  excuses  on 
his  behalf,  195  ;  objects  to  suspen 
sion  of  Habeas  Corpus,  317. 

Tennessee,  application  of  Recon 
struction  doctrines  to,  408,  411, 
423. 

Territories,  the,  questions  of  govern 
ment  and  of  slavery,  63-71,  72, 
73,  74,  81,  83,  97,  98,  103,  104, 124, 
125,  133,  234,  236,  237,  239,  240. 

Texas  Boundary  question,  71,  97, 
103,  104. 

Toombs,  Robert,  senator  from 
Georgia,  on  the  Cuba  Bill,  203  ; 
on  Crittenden's  resolutions,  234. 

Topeka  Constitution,  167,  168,  170, 
171,  174,  180. 

Treaty  of  Paris,  311,  314,  315. 

Trent,  the,  boarding  of,  322. 

United  States  Bank,  attacked  by 
Jackson,  15,  20. 

Van  Buren,  Martin,  9,  16,  17 ;  op- 


Union,  82,  83  ;  far-reaching  effects 
of  this  speech,  83,  84,  85;  ad 
mired  as  an  orator,  86,  87 ;  his 
views  on  Compromise,  96  ;  in  Fill- 
more 's  cabinet  as  a  Compromiser, 
99 ;  on  Fugitive  Slave  Law,  106  ; 
Compromise  candidate,  120. 

Weed,  Thurlow,  meets  Seward,  9 ; 
anti-Mason,  12,  13,  14;  works 
against  Seward,  155 ;  his  part  in 
the  Greeley-Seward  antagonism, 
213,  214,  215 ;  advocates  concilia 
tion  with  the  South,  229  ;  confers 
with  Lincoln  on  make-up  of  a 
cabinet,  231,  233  ;  reports  result 
of  conference  to  Seward,  233 ; 
sent  to  Europe  as  unofficial  agent 
of  U.  S.,  350. 

Welles,  Gideon,  232 ;  secretary  of 
the  navy,  250;  of  little  conse 
quence  as  cabinet  officer,  251 ; 
action  in  the  relief  of  Sumter  and 
Pickens,  215,  254,  255,  256,  271  ; 
on  Seward's  view  of  the  Trent 
affair,  325 ;  and  on  Lincoln's, 
334. 

Whig  party,  formation  of,  20  ;  par 
tial  causes  of  its  overthrow,  26 ; 
condition  after  Seward's  retire 
ment,  43  ;  policy  regarding  Texan 
annexation,  49-53 ;  its  nominee 
in  1848,  55  ;  its  aims  as  declared 
by  Seward,  56-60  ;  political  atti 
tude  in  1850-51,  75;  merged  into 
Republican  party,  143. 

Whitfield,  J.  W.,  delegate  to  Con 
gress  from  Kansas,  167,  171. 


posed  to  Texan  annexation,  49;  |  Wilkes,     Captain    Charles,     seizes 


Free  Soil  candidate  for  the  presi 
dency,  54,  55,  56. 

Wade,  Benjamin,  107,  126,  203,  240  ; 
attacks  Lincoln  in  connection 
with  Reconstruction,  402. 

Walker,  Robert  J.,  governor  of 
Kansas,  qualifications  of,  186 ; 
throws  out  election  returns,  188  ; 
resigns,  189. 

Webster,  Daniel,  action  in  the  Caro 
line  affair,  32,  33 ;  his  opinion 
upon  it,  34,  36  ;  correspondence 


Mason  and  Slidell,  322;  acting 
in  this  on  his  own  responsibility, 
324  ;  popular  hero,  324  ;  officially 
praised,  325  ;  criticism  of  his  ac 
tion,  342,  343, 344. 

Wilmot  Proviso,  the,  53,  193. 

Wirt,  William,  14,  15. 

Wachusett,  the,  captures  the 
Florida,  377. 

Wyandot  Constitution,  205,  208. 

Yancey,  William  L.,  of  Alabama, 
on  slave  property,  205. 


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